BY THE BANKS OF 
STILLWATER 





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BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 



BY THE BANKS OF 
STILLWATER 



POEMS 

BY 
PAUL SHIVELL 



VOLUME 
ONE 



DAYTON 
THE STILLWATER PRESS 

1919 






Copyright, 1908, 1915, 1919 
By PAUL SHIVELL 

Copyright, 1917, 1918 
By the golden RULE COMPANY 



The Stillwater Press, Dayton, Ohio, U. S. A. 
EHectrotyped in Dayton by The Gilbert-Baker-Midlam Company 



©Cf./\515833 



MAY 15 1319 



IMMORTAL COMPANY 

Immortal company of militant friends ! 
Most noble rich in Heaven's uncounted wealth! 
With you I share what glory may be due 
These songs, these race-bom products of a brain 
From social ages rich in human life 
Thus far developed, these joint compositions 
Of our co-authorship, sonant through me, 
Your delegate, to you. For more to you — 
More to you, comrades, than to me — pertains 
What praise, if any, as I think, must greet. 
And must accompany through larger years. 
My name's triumphal march. There was no time 
When without you my pulse beat high enough 
To hint in whispers what with your great help 
Boldly I shouted thus! Uncertainty? 
Here may be diverse faults to trip each critic; 
Doubt, never! He who honors all mankind 
Neither can doubt nor call in serious question 
Man's destiny sublime ! Let not one voice 
Decry our confident expectancy, 
But laugh with us ! Here are high youthful hopes. 
Firm trust, and that much larger fuller faith 
Which needs not argument to make divine 
The years found all-sufficient in themselves, 
With their great promise of continual 

V 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

Renewment in That Future whither time 
Conducts us alL That 1 as in That Day 
Might greet you here ! But no ; these years are brief; 
We will submit; passive we must not be; 
So startling is the prospect lookt straight at 
With ungainsaying eyes ! We will be strong 
In Him Whose patient strength in ages past 
Makes us be patient out of gratitude 
And sober admiration. He it is 
Whose fateful pleasure and Whose master skill 
Hath form'd us and redeem'd us from ourselves 
Unto each other. Therefore Home to Him 
Let us as eager children bear our gifts, 
To grow as ageless angels in His wisdom, 
Progressively immortal. Faint not, we. 
Nor falter; or, if falter, as men may. 
Bear we each other up and on as tho 
We were as mighty in our separate selves 
As mutually we are. Transcendent all. 
In free consent with every natural law. 
On strict obedience implicit, still 
We rise, and are made one with all God's works, 
With all His boundless mind made one, to meet 
As kings in thought's grand kingdom, that rich realm. 
Love's all-inclusive aristocracy. 
Where to be kind is not less regal great 
Than to be hail'd as heroes for famed zeal 
In emprise; where love's golden crown and scepter 
Are sole authority, which God Himself, 
Tho King of Kings, doth not dispute with us, 
Nor we with one another. Our songs yet, 

VI 



IMMORTAL COMPANY 

These measured hymns of time, will with new measure 
Attend us, where, in no such transient forms, 
To noble, nobler, and yet noblest birth 
Will the sweet lyric and the mightier epic 
Persistently arrive. Then each may be 
His best, in keeping with God's high desire 
Whose purpose cannot fail. We are that purpose. 
We; even we. Not thou nor I apart; 
Tho each is by that spirit as complete 
As all he loves; yet 'tis not I nor thou; 
Nor they without us; nay, it is not God; 
Not Christ nor angels, nor the inhabitants 
Of those unguess'd eternities which baffle 
Our deepest thought and dumbfound speculation; 
No, not all these, if thou or I or any 
Of all that deathless undefeatable host 
Be from one heart excluded. Man is One; 
Men shall and must be. What were God's glory else? 
Heaven's magnificence, what can it be? 
What but Love's perfect purpose realized ! 
Then let us realize it here today. 
Forgiving one another and receiving 
With thankful hearts each one his brother's love. 
Or if men hate us, let us hate not back ; 
And if they wrong us, wrong them not again. 
Even finally when driven to defend 
Our homes against them, let compassion spare 
Their homes and country, while with great desire 
We fight for their deliverance from themselves 
Unto each other before God, that so 
We all may yet be closer bound in one, 

VII 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

A freer and diviner fellowship 

Of men and nations, till these times of strife 

Give birth to final union, and all triumph 

Together in one various family. 

When these old hindrances are fallen away. 



THE FLOWERY BANKS OF STILLWATER 

Come, Love, let us wander along 

The flowery banks of Stillwater, 
Where sweet birds woo their mates with song, 

By the flowery banks of Stillwater. 
There thou and I, with the earth and sky, 
Have renew'd our youth in years gone by; 
'Tis heavenly Spring — let us draw nigh 

To the flowery banks of Stillwater ! 

The trees are putting forth their green 
By the flowery banks of Stillwater, 
So fair, so joyous and serene, — 

Oh, the flowery banks of Stillwater! 
Unhinder'd now by shade, the sun 
Shines laughing through on youngsters' fiin, 
Where we, as children, used to run. 
By the flowery banks of Stillwater ! 

Oh, happy days in the happy past. 
On the flowery banks of Stillwater ! 

Oh, years that lead us Home at last 
By the flowery banks of Stillwater ! 

The young fresh hours of Spring are brief; 

Summer will bind the golden sheaf. 

And Autumn too soon cast the leaf. 
On the flowery banks of Stillwater. 
IX 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

But, Love, our days are all delight. 
By the flowery banks of Stillwater; 

The peace of God through grief keeps bright 
The flowery banks of Stillwater. 

The Spring will pass ; 'tis here today ! 

Then come, sweet Gertrude, haste away! 

We '11 wander, loving, while we may, 
By the flowery banks of Stillwater ! 



CONTENTS 



PAGE 

Immortal Company V 

The Flowery Banks of Stillwater VII 

IN PROSPECT OF WAR 

To Battle! (Written 1906) 3 

Ajalon (1906) 5 
Sonnets Written Nineteen-ten 

I. " What are the quarrels of the Old World to me ? " 8 

II. "I urge no personal grievance" 8 

III. ''I bum with shame when I see reasoning men" 9 

rV. *'Thru dust and smoke uprises over the nations" 9 

V. "When I hear crying babies, children squalling" 10 

They Shall See God (Written 1912) 11 

SONNETS 

War Breaks out in Europe, August, Nineteen-four- 

TEEN 

I. **When from the curious excited throngs" 15 

II. "War will not always plague the sure advance" 16 

III. "Back of delay, over and underneath" 16 

rV. "Sweet is the sense of duty in the heart" 17 

XI 



CONTENTS 

SONNETS, Continued page 

V. "The world is full of cowards who will die" 17 

VI. "'As a strong father fostereth his own" 18 

Of the German Blood Carousal into Belgium and 

France 

I. Satanic Ambition 19 

11. Devilish Logic 19 

III. Moral Stupidity 20 

IV. Revolutions Now Inevitable 21 
V. National Egotism — Ethical Confusion — War 21 

VI. Christian Candor 22 
America's Disillusionment 

I. Twisting Truth To Serve Evil 23 

II. Brain Worship 23 

III. We Are Indebted 24 

IV. Moral Passion 25 
V. Attitude Is Destiny 25 

VI. Be Prepared 26 
Our International Police Duty 

I. "A vain, self-righteous, unforgiving spirit" 27 

II . " Immoral German teaching corrupts to conquer " 27 

III. "Too frail, but by no will of mine exempt" 28 

IV. "I do not fear that these United States" 28 
V. " Free states become more free and democratic " 29 

VI. "For any man whose wife has been abused" 30 
VII. "All knaves our brothers? Yes, brother. What 

then?" 30 

VIII. "High time we waked up to the prior claims" 31 

IX. "Home and religion cry aloud against" 31 
X. " The years draw nigh when states must no more 

err" 32 

XII 



CONTENTS 

SONNETS, Concluded page 

XI. "Pick up a daily paper and look through it" 32 

XII. "Did 1 not wish my people wise and great" 33 

XIII. "When I feel downcast that my lot is hard" 34 

XIV. "There are worse fates than death — iniquities" 34 
XV. "The prophet sometimes with a reverent word" 35 

XVI. "Key to and Mystery of the Universe!" 35 

XVII. "There is one definite way to end bloodshed" 36 

XVIII. "I, worry, when God's promise is gainsaid?" 36 

To Alva Martin Kerr: "Whither, I wonder" 37 

On Hard Work 

I. "I like hard work, with crowbar, pick, trowel, 

spade" 38 

II. "The hardest task in all this world would be" 38 

III. "To comprehend in order and assemble" 39 

IV. "Had I been blest with physical endurance" 39 
V. "Thank God, I know that without Him I'm 

nothing!" 40 
The Germans Bombard the Cathedral at Rheims ! 

I. "In that remote mysterious twilight dawn" 41 

II. "Where architecture satisfies the soul" 41 

III. "Indignant at the burning of Louvain" 42 

IV. "In rapt imagination many times" 42 
V. " The great cathedral stands? — will be restored? " 43 

VI. "Beautiful aspiration of the race!" 44 

VII. "In the (long night that brought us to the dawn" 44 

VIII. "From glory still to glory the human heart" 45 

IX. "Ah, shall we ever build again like that!" 45 

X. "Of all peace-loving people fit to trust" 46 

Militant Peace 49 

xra 



CONTENTS 



PAGE 



HOME, NEIGHBORHOOD, FAITH, FRIENDSHIP 

Build THE Dams! 73 

What to me ! 76 

Go, Therefore 78 

The Living Flag 79 

The Watcher 80 
Sonnets to my Pastor, Alva Martin Kerr 

November First 81 
January Snowstorm 

I . ^' Last night I trudged to town in the deep snow " 81 

11. "Ray Anewalt made public sale by crier" 82 

III. "Through snow I bounced home, high on the 

broad back" 82 

IV. "Unless I have a horse that should be shod" 83 
V. "Thank Heaven there has been no boozing- 

place" 84 

VI. "After my basketful of butter had been" 84 

VII. "This afternoon the carrier, long delay 'd" 85 

VIII . " You cannot serve me better than to love me " 85 

Prayers for Virginia To Say 

I. "Morning again! I am awake" 86 

II. "From morning until night, all day" 87 

III. "Safe within my little bed" 88 

Christian Fellowship 88 

Cat Tales Told by Tiny Girlies 89 

The Divine Warfare 90 

Tree Sparrows in February 90 

Golden Scars 93 

Canzone: "Grieve not above this body when it dies" 94 

Divine Guidance 95 

XIV 



CONTENTS 

HOME, NEIGHBORHOOD, FAITH, FRIENDSHIP, Concluded page 

Universal Wonder 96 
Sonnet and Other Verses to Bertha 

L "To gentle Bertha in that place of pain" 99 

II. "Go, little Harbingers of Spring" 99 
Sonnets 

Rupert Brooke 101 

Lusitania 101 

Yet Will I Trust Him 102 
Sonnets: In Travail of Soul 

I. "So thin and high the clouds, they seem to soar " 103 

II. "I am a rapturous despairing throb" 103 

III. "Like one who bears a burden a long way" 104 

IV. "Old Age is in the distance yet; but now" 104 
V. "Forgive me. Master, that I vainly thought" 105 

VI. "Among the first immortals of all time" 106 

VII. "0 my fine-spirited ideal friends!" 106 
VIII. "From intense childhood have I mused and 

dream'd" 107 

IX. "If only I can keep a few firm friends" 107 

X. "Father, I for myself nothing request" 108 

SUMMER AND SUBMISSION 

"He Careth" 111 

Pastoral: "Clovers in the heavy dew" 117 
Sonnets 

Homeward at Sundown 123 

Sabbath Afternoon 123 

The Living Raiment 124 

The King's Image and Superscription 124 

"I Know Now" 125 

XV 



CONTENTS 

SUMMER AND SUBMISSION, Concluded page 

Sonnets 

"When I Consider in what Blessed Ways" 125 

"Dreaming of Living, till our Life Be Past" 126 

Ships at Evening 127 

Hesperus 128 

Thunder Showers near Midnight 129 

Sabbath Evening in Dog Days 131 
Sonnet : " Where August pasture flowers of royal hue " 140 

Naiad 141 



IN PROSPECT OF WAR 



IN PROSPECT OF WAR 



TO battle! 



To battle ! To battle ! The heathen are raging ! 

God and His people, relentlessly loving, 
War on all hideous idols are waging! 

God with His armies on Mammon is moving! 
To battle I To battle ! The strife has been long, 
The struggle between the Right and the Wrong; 
But God has been trying His soldiers true ; 
And these many have grown from the faithful few ! 

To battle ! To battle ! Through freezing and scorching, 
Fast on the scenes of action assembling, 

Christ at the head of His people is marching ! 
Thrones are tottering I Tyrants are trembling ! 

To battle \ To battle ! The onset is led 

By martyrs and prophets the heathen call dead ! 

The angels from Heaven their strength send down ! 

And trumpets by seraphs on high are blown 1 

To battle ! To battle ! Higher, ye toilers. 

Lift, as ye march, your torch of enlightening ! 

Behold the bloody hands of the spoilers ! — 

Their hollow pretentions ! — their schemes for your 
frightening ! 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

To battle ! To battle ! Advance to the fray ! 

The future will build where you struggle today! 

And children who read of your deeds then 

Will be proud to descend from such women and men! 

To battle ! To battle I Love's cohorts are gleaming ! 

Dust like smoke from their tramping feet 
Rises thick where their banners are streaming 

\^^ite and gold in the holy heat I 
To battle! To battle! To battle, ye brave! — 
Not the Fatherland, but the Race to save ! 
Let patriots kiss and be brothers now. 
And Hell, not nations, overthrow! 

To battle! To battle! To battle! To battle! 

God and His Christ and Humanity ever! 
Hark — like the thunder of stampeding cattle — 

The annies of God ! And who shall deliver ? 
Remember the word of the Lord of old : 
Spare not their idols ! — touch not their gold ! — 
Lest Satan, maskt as an angel of light, 
Should obtain a truce and delay the fight! 

To battle ! To battle ! The foe is retreating ! 

They slay themselves in their frantic delusion ! 
On ! On ! On to the final meeting ! 

See in their shrunken ranks what confusion ! 
Remember we fight for our children today ! — 
For their homes and their future ! On ! On to the fray ! 
Behold the warlike progress of Peace ! — 
Humanity's progress — that never shall cease! 

4 



IN PROSPECT OF WAR 



AJALON 

In the Valley of Ajalon 
Joshua made moon and sun 
Stand still till the battle was won 
By the children of Israel, 
So the old legends tell ; 
And many Amorites fell 
On that memorable day; 
For God sent hailstones, they say, 
As they fled before Joshua, 
And smote them that they died. 
In valley, on mountainside. 
Who Jehovah of Hosts defied, 
Who defied Jehovah, the Lord ! 
For they fell that day by the sword 
And hail, ever afterward 
To be a warning to us 
That sin shall perish thus! 
Light streams from the Cross ! 
Darkness flees from the Light! 
Neither by power nor might 
Shall ye prevail, 

but by Jehovah, the Right ! 

Learn from the legend old 
To fight for the Right and be bold ! 
Sun and moon as of old 
Stand still for the hero who dares ! 
The strength of a thousand years 
All in one day appears, 
5 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

To fight in the Right with the few! 
As Jehovah overthrew 
The Amorites and slew 
With great hailstones, they say, 
The foe who fell that day. 
Will He not help us slay 
Evils, without, within. 
Public and secret sin. 
If we believe and begin 
Doing as we are bid, 
Obeying, as Joshua did. 
Who slew the kings that hid. 
Terrified at the sight 
Of Jehovah God, the Light, 
Through eclipse and tempest 
vindicating the Right ! 

Joshua is an example, 

Providentially ample 

As a warning, to them that trample 

Justice under their feet, 

Of the men whom they must meet, 

\^Tiom none shall ever defeat! 

Stem messengers of the Lord 

Who bear not vainly the sword 

To smite the heathenish horde 

In the name and by the command 

Of Jehovah, Who hath plan'd 

To deliver them into our hand ! 

The day is drawing nigh 

When banded Oppression shall cry 



IN PROSPECT OF WAR : AJALON 

Mercy! — and shall fly 

Before the face of events, 

Abandoning percents, 

Estates, utilities, rents. 

To the People, to whom they belong, 

Who have suffered ages of wrong 

At the cruel unjust hands 

of their cunningly strong. 

Nature will not stand still ; 

Time shall perform God's will; 

Tempest and war fulfill 

His purpose. His high behest. 

Perfecting without rest 

The worshipful, the best; 

Refining away the dross. 

Which in the light of the Cross 

Will perish without loss. 

Tlie world through winnowing time 

Will continue to change and climb; 

The Father's Dream Sublime 

Realized will be; 

Men in each other shall see 

Christ, Who is Liberty: 

Shall in His path, through pain, 

Unto Perfect Life attain. 

Where the mind, having shed the brain. 

Will think the thoughts that grow 

Out of the little we know 

Into God's Joy, 

whither with Christ we go ! 
7 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 



WRITTEN IN NINETEEN-TEN 



What are the quarrels of the Old World to me ? 

I read them or ignore them as I choose ; 

But me tho they ignore, mine they must use; 

And I, whatever the consequences be, 
Stand where I stand, agree or disagree. 

Tactlessly candid, tho all else I lose. 

Fortunate still am I who dare refuse 

Obedience in the name of Liberty ! 
Puppets of custom, fools of circumstance. 

By fashion coaxt and flatter'd into doing, 

Not what ye would, but what ye know's expected, 
Ye face, not I, war's overwhelming chance. 

Hopeful of gain, destructively pursuing 

Trade, when ye should have risen on honor and objected ! 



II 

I URGE no personal grievance, recognize 
No private enmity, assume no rights 
Not held by all in common. What incites 
Man against man I heartily despise ! 

No act of heroism can surprise 

Me. Nor shall Europe's ancient racial spites 
Defer my frank enjoyment of delights 
Too often miss'd by the too worldly wise. 
8 



SONNETS 

No slave myself, all slavery I hate! 

No tyrant I, tyrants would I imprison! 

No envier, how should ambition fool me? 
Willing with all my powers to serve the State, 

I serve my family first, honor my reason. 

And in God's name defy the universe to rule me ! 



Ill 

I BURN with shame when I see reasoning men. 
Wealth-ridden, priest-bestraddled, landlord-led. 
Quarrelling over tobacco, beer and bread 
The more they pile up swag ! And there and then 

I hate the whole sad system ! And my pen 
Flies o'er the paper, by the hot heart sped. 
Till I have pour'd out of my teeming head 
High Heaven's contempt! — and I can laugh again! 

If any people in this world can laugh, 
It is the Socialists who have not lost 
In Socialism their individual strength, 

But have grown strong in judgement, as a staff 

Stiffens with age, and who have climb'd and cross'd 
Mountains, and guess'd the future's breadth and length! 



IV 

Through dust and smoke uprises over the nations 
The phoenix. Freedom, out of battle thunder 
Borne high on sunbright wings of startled wonder ! 
Unguess'd by Doubt, unseen from observations, 

9 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

Yet visible in lofty contemplations ! — 
While empires of accmnulated plunder. 
By unforeseen rebellions rent asunder, 
Join in new democratic federations ! 

See how stem laws creative, war-outlasting, 
Busy through many minds in many manners. 
Combine from outlived social forms to burst 

Into new nebulous life ! See youth recasting 
Kingdoms into republics, whence with banners 
Uprise fresh rebels by strong Freedom nursed ! 



When I hear crying babies, children squalling. 
Dogs baridng, and the noises of the street, — 
The sound of many voices, many feet. 
At early morn, and when the night is falling, — 

Hear factory whistles growling, shrieking, calling, — 
Carhorns, trainrushings, horsetrucks clash and beat, 
I marvel how the Lord with man can meet 
Amid the hideous din of strife appalling ! 

For God is in that battle working out 

Through those conflicting interests one Nation, 
That shall transcend the prophets and the seers ! 

Deep in the glorious future a great shout. 
Endlessly echo'd, hails the New Creation, 
Ever advancing through Eternal Years ! 



10 



IN PROSPECT OF WAR 



THEY SHALL SEE GOD 

For my home, our neighbors, all people. 

Singing, I urge each day 
Deep-sighted constructive ambition. 

In the lowly Christian way, 
That whatever the difficulties. 

There shall be no haste nor delay. 

That we all with such gentle courage 
Serenely in Christ should abide 

That His beauty and compassion 
May all ugly boasting chide. 

Till out of the fiery trial 
We come forth purified. 

Then will our past fall from us ! 

Then will our spirits upsoar 
In vigorous knowledge of Jesus, 

Whom to serve is to adore ! 
We shall then be fit for God's presence. 

When unlove tempts us no more. 

Living for one another; 

Serving for joy, not gain ; 
Children of one Great Father, 

Redeem'd by one Savior slain; 
One hope, one faith, one purpose. 

Body and soul and brain, — 

We come, in our generation, 
With patriarchs of old, 
11 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

Prophets and saints and martyrs, 
Whose boldness makes us bold: 

The glorified with the glorying. 
One Shepherd and one Fold! 

From no continuing city. 

We seek that one to come 
Where for the just and the contrite 

God hath prepared us a Home, 
There to enjoy Him forever; 

There to know and be known. 

Soon we shall enter, seeing 

With spiritual eyes, 
Deeper than we have knowledge. 

Wiser than seers are wise, 
The Great Day, the Glad Day, 

When we meet at peace in the Skies ! 



12 



SONNETS 



SONNETS 



WAR BREAKS OUT IN EUROPE, AUGUST, NINETEEN-FOURTEEN 



When from the curious excited throngs, 
A man of thoughtful care, I hide my face. 
And in the ear of God make simple songs 
To please my unspoil'd heart and with wild grace 

Immortalize our virtues, time and place 

Bind me no more : for then my soul belongs 
To other scenes than these, where nothing base 
Disturbs the tranquil mind, nor hint of wrongs 

Upon the spiritual sense intrudes; 

But sin and strife are as bad dreams forgot; 
And darkest sorrows and most bitter moods 

Rise glorified, or vanish into naught. 

Then do I see, as tho my cares were wings, 
The inevitable outcome of all things. 



15 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 



II 

War will not always plague the sure advance 
Of calm intelligent Hope and gentle Peace. 
Can man delay Creation? Is there chance 
With the Almighty ? Think ! For war must cease 

Must pass from Heaven's development in man, 
As God foreknew from the beginning — He 
Who waxt not old with time ; nor ever ran 
Before His purpose; nor forgot to be 

Upon each instant of eternal ages 

The Presence of All Good that ever was, and is, 
And shall be , for the Universe is His : 

He is the Universe! And He presages 

His Own advent and triumph, long foretold 
In every star that wondering seers behold. 



Ill 

Back of delay, over and underneath. 
Is Truth's incessant opposition to that 
Infernal pretense which dares live and breathe 
In human beings on whose ears fall fiat 

Her loftiest challenges and mightiest pleas 
For high nobility. In sacred song — 
Such as have deathlessly preceeded these — 
Lives That authoritative Power Wliose tongue 

Transcends the bounds of language, time and place. 
Giving to man excuse for his existence 
Upon the earth, — building within the race 
16 



SONNETS: WAR IN EUROPE 

An ever-widening Heaven of resistance 
Against an all but irresistible night 
That lingers in brute men, base heirs of Light, 



IV 

Sweet is the sense of duty in the heart 
Of simple man and woman toiling on 
At thankless task, furthering each his part 
In the Great Scheme whose issue is unknown. 

Sweet is the knowledge that it pays each well 
To labor in high hope: that no fell power 
Can rob such trustful spirits as foretell 
In their own Heaven-order'd lives the hour 

Of certain rapture, seldom glimpsed on earth. 
But seal'd and sure and waiting in the womb 
Of time. So helpless babes await the birth 

They have no knowledge of. Shall men presume 
To hasten by miscarriage their seal'd fate. 
Warring against God's plans rather than toil and wait? 



;♦•> 



The world is full of cowards who will die 

Rather than live as God would have men live. 
Hordes rush together at the battle cry. 
Slaying each other sooner than forgive. 

The world is full of fools who would be king, 

Whom the king's knaves can use to work his will. 
For a catchphrase they dare do anything. 
Except the things they should — even worse than kill! 

17 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

The world is full of shams of every kind. 

How little, after all is done, will last! 

Oh, might I for myself that little find ! 
Safe in my bosom I would hold it fast ! 

Teacher! — make me brave and wise and true, 

To please God first in all I say and do. 



VI 

As a strong father fostereth his own, 

God guardeth them that keep with reverence 
His holy law. On tables not of stone. 
But in the secret heart is their defense 

Who trust in Him; there the deep consequence 
Of all their thoughts before His eye alone 
They daily work out moment by moment; whence 
Are manifest His mercies which atone 

For the sad errors of the human race. 

So Jesus lived and died, our chief Example 
And Guarantor, in Whom sin found no place. 

Because He made His heart God's holy temple. 
Unblemish'd Man ! — in Whose high character 
We recognize God's personal universal care. 



18 



SONNETS 



OF THE GERMAN BLOOD CAROUSAL INTO BELGIUM AND FRANCE 



SATANIC AMBITION 

Sensing the rise of Universal State, 

Germany schemes to make Earth Germany! 

The Autocrat, man's old Archenemy, 

Plotting world rule by ruin ! Years they wait. 
Busy with cheap ambition to be great; 

Self-hoodwinkt, self-enslaved, who might be free; 

Scholarly, frugal, toilsome, pious, with three 

Far-grasping murderous hands unawed by Fate ! 
Envied, suspected, fear'd, abhor'd of nations ; 

Once the too-much-admired ; now Time's fierce joke ! 

A noble race to an ignoble yoke 
Inhumanly submissive ! Civilization's 

Bad spectacle ! Religion mired in guile ! 

Materialism slumpt ! Heroically vile ! 



II 

DEVILISH LOGIC 

With insolent disgusting sophistry 

Now the chief moral pervert among nations 
Would justify his criminal aggressions 
And cowardly terrorizing, as tho he, 
19 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

The murderer, not his victim, were the free. 
The wise, the righteous one! Of all obsessions, 
This agony to exalt the brutal passions 
Into a national fetish on the plea 

Of international necessity — 

What dastard broach, of Hell's black postulations, 
More grossly pagan and insane could be ! 

Yet we applauded them, follow'd their fashions, 
And bow'd us down, as tho it had been fit 
That all the nations at their feet should sit! 



Ill 

MORAL STUPIDITY 

Moral stupidity provokes false teaching; 

Blind guides to lead the blind stand ever ready. 

By your false choice your covetous hands are bloody; 

No power could have compel'd you but the itching 
Of your brute lust for power. You'll be beseeching 

For mercy yet. And after that you'll study 

To covet honor. Beware, everybody: 

Violate no man's rights by over-reaching; 
But guard all as your own, lest all confused 

Go back and down in savagery together; 

Whence none return sole victors, but all chasten'd 
Must rise as one, accuser with accused, 

As friends, not enemies, brother with brother, 

Our mutual deliverance thus hasten'd. 



20 



SONNETS: THE GERMAN BLOOD CAROUSAL 

IV 
REVOLUTIONS NOW INEVITABLE 

The ruler who assumes the dictator 

Might weigh and deal with causes and consequences 
First in his mind, before he takes all chances. 
Remembering, autocracy means war! — 

Rebellion ! — revolution ! — and the more 
To be expected as his cause advances. 
Even children, in least haughty words and glances, 
Read invitation violently to abhor 

The perpetrators of they know not what ! 
In all hearts dwells incipient revolt. 
Which tyranny soon fosters, and no wiles 

Nor flatteries can assuage. Wars will be fought 
As long as kings keep their presumptuous holt 
On patriots who dare gainsay their guiles. 



NATIONAL EGOTISM — ETHICAL CONFUSION — WAR 

As long as evil is call'd good, good evil, 

There will be war; and Christians will be found 
Fighting against each other within sound 
And sight of Heaven ! Egg'd on by their devil 

As heroes, they exalt the infernal revel 
Into a righteous passion, and astound 
The world with sacrifice ! Crippled and bound, 
They come back to their sense of what is civil, 
21 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

To think, if whipt, how whipt the enemy was ; 

Or, victors, how supremely great they are; 

And so prepare to fight, these for revenge, 
Those for more prestige. The worthier the cause 

The less occasion should there be for war. 

And yet I would not that the right should cringe ! 



VI 

CHRISTIAN CANDOR 

1 AM a hard, stem, unrelenting foe 

To superstitions, weaknesses and shams. 

There is That in me Which stands up and damns 

And challenges with scorn the first faint show 
Of smooth talk that would coax from yes and no 

A Heaven-responsible utterer who slams 

At frauds what he must think, without flim-flams ! 

I had as lief repeat as let lies go 
Unbranded from my presence. I '11 not take 

One hard word back if what I say is so. 

Lies can't scare facts; and men as God's dynams 
Never will quibble when the Truth 's at stake. 

I '11 be kind and forbearing while I can ; 

But when I face the Lie, I '11 strike! — for God-in-man! 



2^ 



SONNETS 



America's disillusionment 



TWISTING TRUTH TO SERVE EVIL 

We all are bad enough without being thought 
Worse than we are. I trust that I have said 
Nothing in all my verses that if read 
Will give one false impression. I have wrought 

In awful dread of seeming what I'm not ; 
And yet I know my life has beat and bled 
Worse than in vain, if the bright living red 
Will register pink lies; for I was taught 

Better than that. All words are treacherous. 

Men make us say what they would have us think. 
We cannot trust our tongues nor guide the pen 

To say just what we would. Christ on the cross 
Is tortured into lying printer's ink 
To justify the schemes of bad ambitious men. 



II 

BRAIN WORSHIP 

For much of this premeditated bosh, 

These deep-laid long-hatch'd broods of serpent spawn. 
We have ourselves to blame ; for we look'd on 
In worshipful astonishment and gush 

23 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

At all that dreary intellectual slush, 

And let our sons and daughters go and fawn 

And truckle and get stufft and overgone 

By solemn stupids, till their mountainous trash 

Bewilder'd us, and would have stultified 

Our spirit, whose far-fetcht flatteries helpt puff 
Them into scientific souUessness ! 

Had not hallucination, their false guide. 

Crazed them to crime, we might have got that stuff 
Into our blood and made the same foul mess ! 



Ill 

WE ARE INDEBTED 

We are indebted to them for their twaddle. 

The world is wiser for that folly henceforth. 

We trust ourselves more for the shoddy centsworth 

Got by long adulation and slow coddle 
From malted brains. We saw them meekly waddle 

After their masters in the morally dense North, 

While we stood glorifying the immense worth 

Of their self-advertising self-befuddle. 
And now! Are we to do as they've been doing? 

Is their sublime delusion to be ours? 

Are we to hug ourselves and ask all buggers 
To boost our brains? Are we to cease pursuing 

Our Great Idea, and devote free powers 

To breeding up a nation of brute sluggers? 



24 



SONNETS: AMERICA'S DISILLUSIONMENT 



IV 
MORAL PASSION 

There has been too much said on the soft side. 
Beware, my nation, — and thou dost beware: 
I know thee ; and I love thee ; and I swear. 
Blinking no facts, to still believe with pride. 

We covet no man's country! — yet decide 

Again, with strong worldwide benevolent care: 
Thou wilt not victimize the weak; nor dare 
Look sideways at thy duty ; nor misguide 

With smooth perversions of Eternal Fact 
Thy citizens; nor think to cheat mankind 
With sophistry; but more free, and yet more 

Determined to be free, that thou wilt act 
With, not against, thy highest, holiest mind. 
Waging on thine own sins uncompromising war ! 



ATTITUDE IS DESTINY 

We fast become what we prefer to be. 

Feeding new thoughts on thoughts that were our food. 

While destiny determines attitude. 

Our attitude fixes our destiny. 
Fate is environment and heredity. 

Cosmic, terrestrial, racial, neighborhood; 

All ages focus'd in habitual mood ; 

What our ancestors have been, and what we. 

25 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

But in, through, and beneath, and over all, 
God's man, who lays hold on Eternal Cause 
The best he knows, shall know best how to act; 

For, having laid hold high, he shall grow tall 
By taking thought with care to keep the laws 
That must rule as a wise portentious Fact! 



VI 
BE PREPARED 

Men should so live as not to hesitate 
In thoughtful sacrifice for a just cause. 
So should a people by progressive laws 
Their future attitudes anticipate ; 

Nor trust themselves to whim; nor risk the State 
On doubtful prospects, when a fortnight's pause 
Means tragedy ! The time to uncover flaws 
And weaknesses is now ! — not then to wait 

In agonizing struggle and wild guess. 

Explaining why we fail — nay, fail we must not! 
This hour — this generation — century — yes. 

This age — depends on us: if we adjust not 
Ourselves to facts as they arise to threaten, 
We flout the Law, and somewhere shall be beaten ! 



26 



SONNETS 



OUR INTERNATIONAL POLICE DUTY 



A VAIN, self-righteous, unforgiving spirit 

Coils at the heart of all aggressive war. 

Eager to strike, it matters not what for. 

But always with a grievance ready. Fear it ! 
Believe not men who see in self all merit. 

Preening their souls as God's elect. At core 

They lie in wait, a spy at every door! 

Meet, — they are there! Speak secretly, — they hear it! 
This is the Devil of whom Jesus spake ! 

While Christians quarrel'd, he enslaved a nation! 

Who is he, and what is he ? He is man ! 
Man, puift with lust! The sly old slippery snake. 

Pretending piety, while with temptation 

He slimes his flatter'd victim ! Slay him while you can ! 



II 

Immoral German teaching corrupts to conquer ! 
If Europe falls a prey, next comes our turn ! 
It ought to make the soul within us bum 
To see with shame the brutal Prussian junker. 

His heel on Belgium's neck, and we the flunker 
Among great nations ! Shall we never learn 
To live above our boastful unconcern 
For what concerns US all ! Vainer and drunker 

27 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

With blood the Teutons will become, till here 
From insolence they burst forth, Hell's debauch. 
And rend us into ruin! Every grouch 

Who calls himself a Socialist, but is a liar. 
Will rise against this country with a sneer 
And fight for German anarchy with fire ! 



Ill 

Too frail, but by no will of mine exempt. 
Not only do I lift stem voice and cry 
Against war's desecrations, but both I 
And my proud son stand eager to be campt 

And drill'd with veteran watchers who have trampt 
For us these guarded shores, arm'd lest the lie 
Take us by its feign'd sweetness, and we die 
Effeminates ! Let not fashionable contempt 

Sully my lips for those who wam'd and wrought. 
And whom we should have trusted ! Let no shirk 
Suppose me soft ! I have not toil'd in vain, 

And loved these pastoral solitudes for naught ! 
I know what wicked councils are at work 
Emasculating Christ to cause us future pain ! 



IV 

I DO not fear that these United States 
Would violate the confidence of man. 
With Christ we cannot ! Without Christ we can I 
Dare we, my people, become such ingrates, 
28 



SONNETS: OUR INTERNATIONAL DUTY 

Forgetful how we lived through what dire straits. 
To strive with mightiest nations in the van 
Of progress, joint custodians of God's plan, 
For which the bleeding world in anguish waits? 

Shall not the backward peoples come to know 
Our Captain and Deliverer as theirs? 
Could we defraud and disappoint them so? 

Betray their faith for whom the dear Christ cares? 
Looking for their redemption in our peace. 
Shall they not see us vow that violence must cease? 



Free states become more free and democratic 
Through international comity extending 
To all alike, but virile, self-defending, 
And resolutely just. No vague erratic. 

But the Avenger, swift and terrible 
And imminent as life and death, is He 
Upon Whose character is founded free 
The compact of these States whose guarantee 

Not all the world's false prophets can annul! 
Whatso abides must first be founded deep 
In adamantine justice. Men must reap 

As they have sown. Murderers must be kill'd. 
Or kept lockt up, let silly people weep ! 
Crown'd monsters upon thrones no sentiment can 
gild! 



29 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 



VI 

For any man whose wife has been abused 
By a bull coward, — for any son or brother 
Who slays to avenge a sister or a mother 
That villain by this woman's soul accused 

Of worse than murder, — I, a man not used 
To justifying crime, do altogether 
Feel with an understanding heart, nor smother 
The rising flame ! Rape cannot be excused 

Even by German science, nor condoned 

On plea of war. Still must mankind restrain 
And guide these higher passions, and not doubt 

The avenging Law, but vindicate ! They stoned 
In ancient times ; and better we should brain 
Than leave at large, unalter'd, prowling about ! 



VII 

All knaves our brothers? Yes, brother. What then? 
So are the decent, whose defense comes first 
Against the unselfgovem'd mob. And when 
Behind strong walls which none can climb nor burst 

All maniacs are kept, — not as accurst, 
But with intelligent consideration 
And skillful oversight, — then shall we durst 
Indulge the luxury of pity, our worst 

Having been put in proper isolation. 

Each citizen, then, a model of the nation. 
Each nation of the world ; the man or state 

30 



SONNETS: OUR INTERNATIONAL DUTY 

That fails in moral rectitude, to be 

Restrain'd, or if need, punish'd, without hate. 
All to the wholesome praise of liberty. 



VIII 

High time we waked up to the prior claims 
Of innocent posterity — the demands 
Of civilization — the most pure commands 
And statutes of a righteous God, Who shames 

Our vascillating cant and fickle aims 

With His unswerving purpose ! In His hands 
Are all things; and His intent comprehends 
All people of all nations, customs, names; 

For all are His. The iniquitous and the good 
Stand equal at His bar; for all have sin'd 
And forfeited all, the just and the unjust 

Reaping together, as He said they should ; 

The sowers of the wind reaping the whirlwind, 
All flesh corruption. Yet be stem we must ! 



IX 

Home and religion cry aloud against 
The evil of too lenient a hold 
These days on powerful criminals ! Of old 
With wild fanatic glee savages danced 

About their victims, who, it often chanced. 

Were of their kind, and would have been as bold 
To join the frenzy. Men like beasts were sold, 
Beaten, and chained in dungeons. Crime advanced, 

31 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

And knave exceeded knave in opulent vice 

And sneakery ! Now the sentimental evil 

Is, we are over-scrupulously nice 
In dealing with great scoundrels as if civil. 

Not criminal, frauds ! Justice has been disarmed 

By Mercy, Peace delay 'd, and every good cause barm'd. 



The years draw nigh when states must no more eiT 
On either side as now they err on both. 
Justice will vindicate herself as Truth 
To honest hearts, tho diplomats concur 

In adroit circumlocutions and still stir 

Hate in the people's hearts. Knaves loll in sloath. 
Circumvent laws, and under solemn oath 
Perjure themselves, dodge taxes, and deter 

Man's progress yet wherever possible, 

So scurvy with the dead and unslought past 
Are all our backward institutions. Lies, 

Shaming our boasted progress ! Heaven and Hell 
Marching to Christian music ! Freedom with caste 
Mixt up, in church and state, college and enterprise! 



XI 

Pick up a daily paper and look through it, 
And ask yourself if advertisers divulge 
Commercial facts. Not many men dare do it. 
Gaze at the big-eyed headlines : how they bulge 

32 



SONNETS: OUR INTERNATIONAL DUTY 

With over-statement! So an empty cruet, 

Smear'd with molasses, will draw most flies to it. 
For news purveyors must, they say, indulge 
A childish public. Rub your trap with suet! 

sophistry! thy name is — Prussianism? 
Here, everywhere the mighty little leaven 
Keeps quietly at work; and lawyers, even. 

Are to be found who never could be driven 
To prey upon the innocent. Sarcasm? 
No, this is, really, enthusiasm. 



XII 

Did I not wish my people wise and great, 
I, too, could let ambition swell my speech: 
Could put aside humanity and teach 
What goes before a nation's fall: could sate 

My soul with monstrous dreaming, and face Fate 
With grim burlesque ! But would my neighbors each 
Prove gullible — be taught to over-reach 
And grasp at half the world with hideous hate ! 

America loathes with vigilant defiance 
Old snake-eyed Usurpation which directs 
The private soul's heroic sacrifice 

Into a power-worshiping compliance 
With military murder! Such abjects 
Require our pity that they were not wise. 



33 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 



XIII 

When I feel downcast that my lot is hard, 
It does not satisfy my soul to know 
That everywhere most men find their lot so. 
I grieve to think how many lives are mar'd 

That might be sweet if most men stood strict guard 
And helpt each other as God bids us. Oh! — 
I think it would be beautiful to grow 
More upright, yet more gentle, in accord 

With our Great Father's wishes for us all. 
As Jesus in His heavenly life on earth 
So kindly shows us. But we love self best, 

And take slight pains to please God, hence we fall 
Into bad habits, setting too much worth 
By schemes with which our minds become obsesst. 



XIV 

There are worse fates than death — iniquities 
More reprehensible than vandalism. 
There is a seeming peace that, while a chasm 
Yawns between states full-arm 'd for wars like these. 

Bridges and brings together. Good men please 
Their fancy with fond hopes, till the hell-spasm 
Vomits! — and with sublime enthusiasm 
Bewilder'd boys rush forth to fall ! Kings sieze 

On any pretext, so it be a lie ! 

They cannot speak plain truth ! Had truth been spoken, 
— War? — no! — there are not simpletons enough! 

34 



SONNETS: OUR INTERNATIONAL DUTY 

Prime rights there are for which most men would die : 
These are kept threaten'd ; and arm'd truce once broken. 
How shall Disease, Rapine and Murder be call'd off! 



XV 

The prophet sometimes with a reverent word 
Will bid irreverence cease and nations kneel. 
Into the speaking presence of the Lord 
His anguish brings proud hearts and makes men feel 

Ashamed of their false pride, stirring to zeal 
From penitence. But if he be not true. 
His words are wasted and have no appeal; 
For tho they seem to accomplish that whereto 

They seem directed, and to really do 

The work of God, not so. God does His work, 
And always did do all, if men but knew. 

As the clear sun shines on when earth is dark, 
Creation is enlightening and proceeds 
According to God's object and man's needs. 



XVI 

Key to and Mystery of the Universe ! — 

On Whom proud men of unregenerate brain 
Bring all their wits to bear, scheming in vain 
To falsify What they cannot explain — 

We look to Thee, both to escape the curse 
Of superstition and idolatry. 
And to enjoy the knowledge that in Thee 
We each can be what God wants us to be, 
35 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

Ourselves at our own individual best. 
With that fair expectation always bright, 
And the Way open while we seek aright. 

Our minds are clarified by every test 
That brings us hourly nearer to fulfilling 
God's heavenly purpose as we grow more willing. 



XVII 

There is one definite way to end bloodshed: 
The foremost nations must the strongest be ! 
Enlightened militant democracy 
Must rule the federated world ! Instead 

Of being by swashbuckling bluffers led 
To autocratic slaughter, let us free 
Those ignorant boys, and end that royal spree ! 
Obnoxious now, when they have starved and bled 

And stagger'd down from triumph to defeat, 
Soak'd sober in their own fast ebbing life. 
They will give up Hell's hopeless fearful strife, 

And beg for Christian peace. Then all shall meet. 
Good neighbors, and resolve as one that war 
Between democracies shall be no more ! 



XVIII 

I, WORRY, when God's promise is gainsaid? 
The angels know that I am glad with them ! 
Seraphic among shining seraphim, 
Far in the future I project my head — 
36 



SONNETS 

Beyond the stars, colossus-like, outspread 
Majestic wings ! For I am one with Him 
Who bounds Eternity! Aloft I swim 
Above those warring atoms — peer whence their dead 

Are fast besieging Heaven — and I shout 
PEACE ! And succeeding generations there 
Among those echoing mountains as one voice. 

Like distant music heard with ears devout, 

Answer! — while starbright souls ascend in prayer — 
And the enraptured Heavens, listening, rejoice! 



TO ALVA MARTIN KERR 



Whither, I wonder, and how fares my friend? 
So soon he disappear'd, so long he stays. 
We grow now anxious for him as the days 
Bring meagre word. When will his journey end? 

Is his frail health not hopeful? — does he mend? — 
Or what? — and why? Perhaps in rapt amaze 
He rests among grand mountains, — or will gaze 
On the wide sea, — while shades of night descend, 

And in that lofty theater the stars 

Begin to play their silent parts for him. 
Where God is Playwright, God Stagemanager, 

And the Great Prompter God ! He sees red Mars 
Ascendant now, where warclouds cannot dim 
The splendor of that scene in that wide theater I 



37 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 



ON HARD WORK 



I LIKE hard work, with crowbar, pick, trowel, spade. 
Laying stone wall, or digging a tile ditch. 
On my own time, not some boss to enrich, 
But cautious of expense, to build, fill, grade. 

Sod, park and beautify, plant trees for shade. 
And make the world a pleasant place in which 
To bring up children. First I plan and sketch, 
Alter, develop, then when the scheme is laid 

To scale on paper, I will spare no pains 
To get each detail so all parts agree. 
And nothing has been overdone or slighted. 

Such work is rest. But now, body and brains 
Rebel at all exertion as drudgery. 
And will not be even in sleep united. 



II 

The hardest task in all this world would be, 
Without Christ, to believe our Maker cares. 
I cannot comprehend the charity 
That loves me and appreciates my prayers. 

I 've trudged the crowded streets of a great city. 
Proud and rebellious, and have still loved men; 
But scorn'd with all my soul to seek their pity : 
Work at just wage was all I wanted then. 
38 



SONNETS 

Foolish? I 'd rather die than stoop or crawl 

To get what 's due me in most dire distress. 

I know there are kind people everywhere; 
I '11 speak for them and for the good of all ; 

But for myself, no, I will not confess 

My personal need, but walk proud and keep square. 



Ill 

To comprehend in order and assemble 

These vigorous faculties that else would mar 
Their wise Creator's purpose, I make war 
Outside myself — will not submit nor tremble, 

But march right on, head up, and if I stumble, 
God's there to give me courage and restore 
My strength against the day when I '11 need more 
Than I can use yet; for I '11 not dissemble, 

But act straightforward without weak pretense, 
Dealing as I have dealt, on the same hard 
Uncompromising principles as now 

I strive to live by before God, and hence 
Must demonstrate. For I am on my guard, 
Facing all facts of life with serene brow. 



IV 

Had I been blest with physical endurance 
To stand up to the heavy tasks I like. 
What more could heart desire? Still I can hike 
Among the stars with laughing self-assurance ! 
39 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

And hate sin with implacable abhorrence ! 

Inspire respect as I come down the pike ! 

And if I 'm struck I can refuse to strike ! 

Fight if I 'm forced to, and still show forbearance ! 
I live in just the age and hour and spot 

That suits me best, wherever I may be. 

Have just the limitations and the task 
That fit the case, whether my choice or not. 

If I can feel, altho I may not see. 

That I am doing as my Lord would ask ! 



Thank God, I know that without Him I 'm nothing ! 
And may that hour not come wherein I fail 
To seek His counsel ; for my need is great ; 
So great I cannot know how great it is ! 

Enough that I am not my own, but His; 
And trusting Him, whatever time and fate 
May have in store for me, naught shall prevail 
Against me! Tho without Him I am nothing, 

In His all-strength I am as powerful 
As I dare be: unfathomable Source 
And Center of my life ! And may my heart 

For gratitude fail not, but grow alert 

To do Him thoughtful service with all the force 
He lends my mind, that else were mean and dull. 



40 



SONNETS 



THE GERMANS BOMBARD THE CATHEDRAL AT RHEIMS ! 



In that remote mysterious twilight dawn 

When man's intelligence first found expression 

In sculptured rock, from which he learn'd to fashion 

Rude implements and weapons, graving thereon 

Apt semblances of strange beasts, long since gone 
With the first artists, there were even then 
Primeval builders among savage men, 
Who speak to us in monstrous altar stone 

And earthwork; and these finally reach'd their height 
And demonstrated the magnificence 
And grandeur of their mighty enterprise 

In awful temples, till we find our sight 

Thrill'd by the great cathedrals, with a sense 
Of their vast beauty soaring to the skies ! 



II 

Where architecture satisfies the soul. 
We feel ennobled by the echoing sound 
Of our own footfalls! — while we gaze around 
In mute astonishment, both that the whole 

Structure and that each detail shows the control 
Man exercises loftily to astound 
Himself with his divine instincts ! The ground 
Beneath our feet has toil'd up with one sole 
41 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

Intelligent purpose: to redeem with strength. 
Unto exalted dignity of form 
And beauty of expression, all that past 

By which we came unto the breadth and length 
And height of such fine aptitude, through storm 
And stress, to do things godlike, that shall last. 



Ill 

Indignant at the burning of Louvain, 

For Rheims I walk'd the fields in grief and wept ! 
man, hell-bent on murder! thou hast slapt 
Thy Savior in the face, and at His pain 

Mockt, while He loved you still; and still for gain 
Thou hast betray'd Him; but through death He kept 
God's purpose to redeem you ! Oh, accept 
His proffer'd peace and gentleness — refrain — 

Refrain thy feet from swiftness to shed blood ! 
Nobly in paths of prayer turn all thy thoughts ! 
Let fierce Destruction her doom'd self destroy, 

And not halt thee, who art the blest of God ! 
Thy destiny is more than lines and dots 
On a king's map, heir of immortal joy! 



IV 

In rapt imagination many times 

I 've stood and watch'd and worshiped in thy streets, 
Where bursting steel shrieks death! — and loud hoofbeats 
Of cavalry instead of evening chimes 

42 



SONNETS: RHEIMS CATHEDRAL 

Are heard, burnt and desecrated Rheims ! 
Christ's fairest monument no longer greets 
The beauty-loving eye, nor proudly meets 
Man's highest expectation! The soul climbs 

To heights like this in carved stone no more. 
Imperious and irreverent is man: 
Busy with armies and material schemes, 

Kings have their dark way with him as of yore : 
He spares to God what little time he can 
From building mortal power on love's demolish'd 
dreams. 



The great cathedral stands? — will be restored? — 
All its ennobling and transcendent beauty 
Yet to these eyes may speak in that quaint city 
Where yet these reverent feet may come? Good word. 

Bringing small comfort. Oh, that men abhor 'd 
Sin ! — and in mutual furtherance of duty 
Would live! — not flock to death and without pity 
Slaughter each other in Thy name, dear Lord ! 

Cathedrals have their value ; but what worth 
Can be ascribed to grandeur more than Thou, 
Father, hast for the least of men through love 

Made possible? Not all the templed earth 

Could balance in Thy sight the hearts that bow 
To humble tasks which their devotion prove. 



43 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 



VI 

Beautiful aspiration of the race ! 

Thy lovely silent protest seems in vain. 

Around thy ruins, piling up the slain. 

The war goes on, the ancient world's disgrace 

Disgracing yet the nations in the face 

Of the dear Christ. Oh, why will men profane 
Thy holy altars. Lord, and with bad Cain 
Murder their brothers, and themselves debase ! 

Sweet piled-up sacrifices of the past ! 

Earth's counterpart of what in Heaven must be ! 
Thou hast fiU'd full thy part in the sad labors 

To which His life He gave. Be not downcast. 
My soul, but still believing. Time shall see 
These very nations one, and all men friends and 
neighbors. 

VII 

In the long night that brought us to the dawn 
Of modem days, this giant lily grew; 
And none but the divine Creator knew 
How, when the darkness finally was gone, 

This lovely myriad-petal'd flower of stone 

Would stand before men's minds in the soft blue 
Of those deep tender skies, like a grand view 
Of God Himself, wondrous to gaze upon ! 

But is the long, long night really past? — 

While men in God's just presence can despise 
And hatefully desecrate His priceless token ! 

44 



SONNETS: RHEIMS CATHEDRAL 

Yes ; for in vain the false betrayer tries 
To force us back into that dreadful vast ! 
Our hearts may break, but Satan's power is broken! 



VIII 

From glory still to glory the human heart. 
With vigorous determined will aspiring. 
Leads on the racial thought to the acquiring 
Of apter skill in science and in art, 

Making of matter the mind's counterpart, 
Project to prospect answering without end. 
Returning on our past, we still transcend 
Immediate expectation with some start 

Suggested by late failures, on and up 

And ever young, from out the past once more. 
By some fresh excellence that naught can stop. 

Surpassing all that ever went before. 
Till now the universal mind of man 
Begins to see that what we will we can ! 



IX 

Ah, shall we ever build again like that! 
Shall man, aspiring with enlighten'd brain. 
Yet higher, nobler altitudes attain? 
Shall he with contrite strength of purpose yet 

Surpass proud Rome? — a finer finial set 
Upon a fairer spire conceived with sane 
Unsuperstitious brow that shall disdain 
All sacrilege with a divine regret? 
45 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

Oh ! I must think that it shall yet be so — 
That man, to his Creator's image wrought, 
Shall make as he is made, more and more true. 

His mind, expanding as his faith shall grow, 
Must follow still his far-projected thought. 
Until his earthly work is done which he must do. 



Of all peace-loving people fit to trust, 

Does any man with whole-soid'd hate abhor 

The military life? — I loathe it more! 

It seems to me most heinously unjust 
That men who do not want to quarrel must ! — 

That boys who know not what they 're fighting for 

Should be incensed against each other! War? 

How speak my hot contemptuous disgust ! 
Only by jailing those responsible 

For war's continuance can war be ended; 

And no amount of blood and treasure expended 
Can be compared with such world peace as shall, 

After this monstrous grapple, be at last 

Establish'd on the ruins of the past ! 



46 



MILITANT PEACE 



MILITANT PEACE 

There are times when I feel as if I were 

That innocent brave soldier once again: 

A little harmless inoffensive child 

Imagining himself a sturdy hero ! 

Then I go fifing, drumming, blowing bugles, 

Along the road to town, or through the pasture. 

To my own martial music keeping step, 

Grand as a brigadier in uniform, 

An army in my soul ! Not now I worship 

The plumed chapeau, sash, epaidets, belt, sword, 

Ornaments and insignia. No more 

On dress parade for envious boys dash by 

Equestrian birds-of-paradise in blue 

And gold, becorded and bestriped and terribly 

Important! These old loose patch'd overalls 

Are statelier to me than all that cheap 

Discarded trumpery. But it took the eye 

With color and with pompous form and orderly 

Advance ! It had the effect 'twas meant to have. 

Convincing little stout hearts in the street ! 

The populace was dazzled! Youth fell in line, 

And march'd away before proud weeping mothers! 

Maidens hung with romantic admiration 

On handsome soldier lads going to war 

Against their country's foe ! And warm true hearts 

49 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

Not all in vain were stir'd to many an act 
Of patriotic sacrifice and deep 
Devotion to their God. War! The Rebellion 
Held with dark, sad, exciting memories yet 
The imagination of our little worid, 
When heroes in their faded uniforms 
Were common as blue flowers. Small captains, fired 
To imitative action, led in battle 
Their mimic armies to the incessant beat 
Of tinpan drums, over wild vacant lots, 
Down foreign alleys, through dread backyards — bang! 
Bang ! — bang ! — vociferated every fierce 
Defiant youngster, squinting down the barrel 
Of black imaginary blunderbus ! 
Batter'd pot-cover cymbals clasht with dire 
And dreadful clangor to the toot and shrill 
Of horns and fifes ! Conflicting the commands 
To fire ! — to charge ! — to halt ! — but the retreat, — 
Tliat was a pell-mell impulse of the soul, 
Defying orders! Dead came back to life. 
And down again fell slain ! 'Twas terrible ! 
Big childhood, pretematurally murderous. 
Made war a butchery ! But none 
Was badly hurt. The reminiscent veteran 
Told tales of camp and prison, — of battlefields 
Reeking with bloody carnage ! Hideous 
The roar! — the smoke! — the tumult! — the headlong 
Peril-defying charge and hand-to-hand 
Encounter with heart-seeking bayonet 
And swift sword ! Flash and fall pistol and man 
Together ! Over faces and mangled bodies 

50 



MILITANT PEACE 

Blown into vulture's meat beyond human semblance 
They hack-stab-shoot-pound-throttle-curse each other! — 
Leaving the brain'd and silenced, wounded and dead, 
Piled up for surgery or burial 
Or putrifaction, breeding dread disease. 
Maggots and buzzards. Groaning in hospitals. 
Beseeching to be put out of their maim'd 
And miserable despairing life, they wait 
Through year-long days and nights their turn, 
And finally having that, their death, or dreary 
Pathetic half-existence in a shatter'd 
And helpless hulk; else back to try again 
Killing and being kill'd. And that were better 
Than lingering in pain, sick, motionless 
From loss of blood ; while thoughts of home and mother 
Wake the weak flesh with tears during long nights 
Pass'd hour by hour in lonely faint desire 
For life and strength, to see and reassure 
Fond hearts, kiss dear kind faces, once again. 
Always a dying somewhere in the stillness; 
Always a carrying out to burial; 
And more brought from the rumble in the distance; 
Moanings, with dreams of tumult! — staggerings back! — 
Wild clutchings out! — long fallings into darkness! 
What tales they told ! How dreadful did it seem ! 
Yet always was it calculated to fire 
Self-confident youth, and awe the credulous 
With scenes of enviable fortitude 
And sacrifice, keeping alive in man 
The old outworn delusion, that supremely 
On battlefields, in carnal strife, is courage 

51 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

Triumphant over fear — that man fighting 
Best serves his age — that only midst mad waste 
Of human life can patriot prove himself 
A patriot indeed. Our loyal hearts 
Must to old customs and traditions bow 
With that unquestioning implicit trust 
Which absolute authority demands 
In the all-sacred name of the Most High ! 
As tho submission and obedience 
Were necessarily noble ! Too little said 
In burning condemnation of the bestial 
Debauchery which made the soldier's life 
As grave a menace to posterity 
As the alternative curse from which he saved us ! 
Yet vice waits not on war; for vice is war; 
And both are Hell ; and Hell is of the heart. 
Peace is proportion'd unto righteousness; 
For righteousness is peace; and peace is Heaven. 
These are the great alternatives, the fates : 
Choice rests with us ; and day by day we choose ; 
And as we choose we bless or blight our lives 
With peace or war; and both are cumulative. 
Righteousness in our favor, iniquity 
Against a day of national reckoning — here 
When we shall least expect it ! God yet rules ; 
And man must bow in meek obedience 
Before His holy law and absolute will. 
No matter what his vanity prefers. 
We are not man's crude workmanship : He made us ; 
And He cannot be false to His Own trust. 
Whose instant awful task we are. 

52 



MILITANT PEACE 

So shaped 
In biblical nobility were the Christians 
Who in their humble thoughts dared entertain 
Unpopular doubt: who, having themselves waged 
War against war within, — Heaven against Hell 
Prevailing! — dared on high principle oppose 
Carnality, with all its works ; for all 
Are equally wicked in the sight of God : 
False peace and self-security no less 
Than war. Tho all true men deprecate war. 
We know that war will baffle peace till justice 
Is honor'd among nations, and right rules! 
So, free men, disagreeing less and less. 
And more and more united, shall, we think. 
By God's grace, in the not too distant years. 
Accomplish peace and hand the victory on 
To their descendants. Ignoble and degrading 
Is war ; but the degraded and ignoble 
Are always, everywhere, cursing the world ! 
Only the inherent nobleness 
Of divine human nature, after centuries 
Call'd Christian, in the light of Heaven can see 
What high-soul'd independence peace requires. 
Great menacing armaments by pagan force 
Maintain'd against the questioning centuries 
Men challenge now as nations in an age 
Surcharged with peace ideals not all yet 
Deeply accepted. For the primal purpose 
Of gilt and tinsel, from the painted savage 
To modem pomp, has been, to dazzle friends 

53 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

And frighten enemies. All ceremony 
Is a cheap substitute for truth and justice. 
Men camouflage their purposes from each other. 
And the great age of racial comradeship 
From century to century postpone. 
Yet who will say peace is not nearer now 
Than sane, strong, equitable, brotherly peace 
Has ever been ! The world by war is made 
Less bellicose. Like strong drink, or indulgence 
Even in good, battle becomes revolting, 
And in the wise economy of nature 
Disgusts us all at last, and makes of soldiers 
Moral reformers and peace advocates. 
Men are not quite such fools as once they were; 
They ask less pomp and more reality; 
Stale idle soldiering appeals not now 
To busy men in this tremendous age. 
Our sons grow satisfied with home and friends, 
Where such pursuits as promise healthier minds 
Demand their thought. Why weigh their future down 
And prostitute their reason to tom-toms — 
To all that neolithic inheritance 
From a dead past? Why drag a chamel house 
Of dark ancestor worship, with all its cruel 
Wierd mesmeristic frummery, long since 
Discredited, and never, let us hope. 
To be respectable again! Half-slought, 
War drops off slowly from the future's 
Emerging body. We stand out ashamed. 
In open acknowledgement before the world 
That war is ignorance, therefore criminal, 

54 



MILITANT PEACE 

Hence cannot be exalted with specious pleas 
Of race necessity ! War is delusion ! — 
A drunkard's dream ! — a maniac's paradise ! — 
A cry of **Thief !" cunningly staged for plunder! 
Too far war now has hounded our advance 
Like a fierce pack of wolves! — or bands of ruthless 
Marauders! — which we could not hope to more 
Than keep at bay, or frighten for a time. 
Knowing they would again catch up and find us 
Never too well prepared. Then treadmill progress moved 
So slow as to be imperceptible from age 
To age; while generation follow'd blindly 
On generation, to no purpose, it seem'd. 
But tribal rivalry, tyrannic ambition, 
Religious fanaticism, and excesses 
Of every base kind that our mortal weakness 
Could conjure up. But now, at last, we thought. 
Invention and the spirit of the times 
Carried us fast ahead and urged us on 
To such achievements as left far behind 
The plagues and terrors that had dog'd us long 
Through tedious years. Still falsely in the name 
Of God and Christian civilization gambling 
For prestige and the markets of the world. 
Ourselves and one another we enslaved. 
And risk'd our hard- won peace. Now we must enter. 
Not of our choice, this bitterest struggle, and fight 
As men have never fought, against new foes. 
Created for no diabolical use. 
But wrested from God's purpose by foul fiends. 
And turn'd against humanity ! No choice 

55 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

Is left us but to spoil the infernal sport, 
And make those devils rue the day they stuck 
Their heads up out of Hell with frightful faces, 
After their forty-years conspiracy, 
To bluff by brutal murder, in God's name. 
The race our Savior died for on the cross ! 
Now when peace-loving Christians who foresaw 
Great change in man are disappointed and sad, 
Let them not be self-righteous and condemn 
The brave who fought for freedom, and who henceforth 
Must fight for peace, as long as powerful foes 
Demand it. We are not yet out of the woods. 
Let vigilance not be relaxt; but rather 
At full strength, with all- watchful discipline, 
Must we who look for permanent peace maintain 
Our vigor, and with set determination 
One course pursue, looking to see establish'd 
And guarded as a grave reality 
The noble dream that else were worse than vain. 
Tho war must pass into sublime disuse. 
And in historical perspective be 
A wonder legend of the past, not so 
The warrior — never the free valiant spirit 
That went to war! But let courageous hearts 
Unite to the great universal cause. 
Democracy ; and let brave men be just 
In mutual service: that unmutual war 
May perish of its pathos, and be ever 
A pity to the nations and a sorrow 
Before mankind. Until that hour is come, 
I shall not hesitate to take my stand 

56 



MILITANT PEACE 

On the just side of international quarrels. 

And give my voice to end them for all time 

As they arise, putting not off with weak 

And cowardly postponement what today 

Demands the world's attention ! While I voice 

The Christian's Hope, I sympathize with all 

Who seek to solve their problems, not to shirk them. 

The universe cannot be limited ; 

Nor will I be, who am the universe 

In miniature. And shall I limit man? 

Am I a fool, that I should set myself 

God's task! When kings presume to interfere 

With a Republic! — bidding free men conform 

To their distortions! — rise up, Man, in wrath! — 

Slay them ! — leave not a vestige of their power ! 

Posterity demands it ! From the ground 

Cries out the sacred blood of heroes ! — War ! — 

War! — War! — till the usurpers cry upon their knees 

For mercy! Then let vindicated Right, 

Magnanimous, dictate and guard the peace. 

'Twill come ! But first the nations must join forces 

Against this universal foe, and conquer! 

'Twas in man's blood : a great war had to come. 

And sicken us with loathing of our past. 

That nations might be just at home and honest 

With one another, as all must and shall be ! 

Hence when the master mood is on me thus. 

Heroically do I comport myself, 

With a decisive military tread. 

As if I were the nations of the earth 

Moving to battle! — no more against each other, 

57 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

But all on one just side, and all to one 
High animant hymn, the words whereof I feel 
Down through my blood, and in my brain, and out 
From every pore and nerve of my rhythmic body, 
Demanding timed expression ! Improvisations 
Original and unpremeditated. 
Bolder than any master's masterpieces. 
Possess me with a mighty power, and surge 
Through all my being ! August I march ahead, 
The proud drum major whirling with dexterous hand 
His tassel'd baton like a fiery wheel ! 
I toss it high — and as it turns and falls — 
Catch it — whirl it — and still beating time. 
Step onward to the music in my soul ! 
I am the sweet musicians keeping step 
To my own winged wild concoursive spirit ! 
I the glad notes harmoniously blown 
And nimbly finger'd from the golden bells 
Of silver horns, and from the ebony-throated 
Shrill- warbling piccolos fifed ! With bright brass clang'd. 
Cymbal on cymbal, in my bosom ringing 
To measured time beat loud from deep, hoarse, harsh. 
Reverberating drums, I throb and swell 
In unison, a marching host! — within me 
All instruments of a military band 
Concording, as redeem'd Humanity 
Shall yet concord in Truth's triumphant hour. 
When men share common life on equal terms 
As brothers, and all wars that must be fought 
Are ended and forgotten in the light 
Of loftier days ! But now I billow along, 

58 



MILITANT PEACE 

Regiments of militia on the march, 
Led by the Prince of Peace to victory! — bands, 
Rmnbhng artillery, clattering cavalcades, 
Interminable grand wave on grand wave 
Of bright batallions in brave uniforms, — 
Officers in regalia prancing by, — 
Legions of angels hovering in air. 
Gold-panoplied and by archangels led, — 
Crowds cheering, — a world war within myself. 
Sweeping to battle before the Lord of Hosts ! 
What care I if nobody cares that I 
Feel so magnificent with moral splendor ! 
Let such as shrink within themselves take heart: 
Not all the sensitive, not all who faint. 
Not all who hesitate to shed blood are cowards; 
Nor are all soldiers moral heroes. Go, 
Commit thy body back to earth, thy spirit 
To Him who gave it; with a prayerful heart. 
If thou canst not destroy thy brother's body. 
Nurse it to life ; minister to the dying ; 
Feed, clothe and house the desolate; but never, 
As thou desirest the respect of man. 
Play neutral with great issues ! At thy peril 
Thou takest lightly what should stir in thee 
A deeper, holier reverence toward God, 
Anxiety and sorrow for mankind. 
Resentment against all forms of injustice ! 
Fine rhetoric is a poor substitute 
For passionate fellow feeling with betray 'd 
Hmnanity ! It is thy duty, thy mission, 
To be intelligent, and not confuse 

59 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

Thyself nor them that look to thee for guidance. 

Moral confusion is inexcusable 

In any man. As thou hast influence. 

Or seekest to have, thou hast no right to fumble 

Great facts, failing in the discharge of life's 

Most paramount duty : to think upright thoughts. 

Act nobly, and as a strong truth-speaker learn 

And teach in steadfast unconcern for self. 

To die in battle, be the cause most just, 

Were no more than to live with one's whole might 

For righteousness and justice and good will 

Among all men. Life demands no less courage 

Than death : both must be faced in the same strength. 

And to the same high purpose. 

Irrational talk! 
Where liberty and justice are assail'd, 
How can a neutral peace be honorable ! 
Preach not to me a passive pacifism ! 
Whatever else I am or men may be, 
I would grow strong and masterful in spirit. 
Ruling my thoughts and passions with a divine 
Self-dominant personality under God ! 
What tho I march alone, I dare be I, 
Composite and sufficient in myself, 
A personal representative of the race. 
As all true souls are. Shall I be disturb'd. 
Because I seem so unlike other men. 
Being so like them all in everything: 
An advocate and a despiser of peace. 
Loathing bloodshed, yet seeing God in soldiers, 

60 



MILITANT PEACE 

As in all human life, the Friend of man, 
Helping each work out his escape from self 
Through suffering, until he turn to God 
And as a contrite act of reverence 
Worshipfully surrender and submit 
To be disarm'd with all his fellow men? 
Ah, are the nations ready to do that? 
Are there enough who've had enough of war? 
He doubts not God who doubts not his own manhood. 
Who doubts not his own manhood doubts not man. 
I who love both, shall I not still believe 
Most men love God tho they admit it not? 
Tho men should kill my body, I will trust 
That somewhere, sometime, they must love God yet. 
Must see in Him their Brother and their Friend ! 
Fools would deny God for His pure exalted 
Severity and proud unwearying march 
Against all compromise with public wrong. 
Tliey cannot hate Him ; 'tis themselves they hate ; 
Sin shames them; weakness mocks them; and they kill 
To hush the Voice and justify their lust. 
Authority against his sin man spurns; 
Loathes innocence; kills truth; murders his friend! 
When God speaks, man must hear, or hate himself. 
So nations, whose iniquity has grown 
Beyond control, take refuge in destruction. 
And are destroy'd! — or to their mutual good 
Scourge one another in their fateful hour 
Of reckoning ! Be sure our turn will come ; 
And we, even tho we justify our course 
By Heaven's inviolable will, must suffer. 

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BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

When nations forget God, and substitute 

Logic and ritual for fervent love, 

Serve self, and hate each other, judgement breeds 

As a great storm: the more delay'd, the more 

It threatens : till the surcharged atmosphere 

Bursts with relentless fury and engulfs 

Guilty, innocent, fool, wise, just, unjust. 

All in one roaring flood of ruin ! Man : 

Does it seem hard to keep the law — to serve 

Thy Maker and to honor Him each hour 

With upright life and truthful speech — is it hard? 

The penalties for self-will must be paid : 

Paid to the last groan in blood and bitter anguish: 

Paid in hot sweat and tears. Yes, the sad costs, 

Tho never bargain'd for, must all be met. 

Art thou unhappy at the thought of this ? 

Be not cast down. Neither be frivolous. 

There is a golden mean 'twixt devotees 

Of war and peace : there walk with Him Who trod 

That path alone, to which all men must come 

From violence and bloodshed, for clean hands 

And pure hearts; and from selfish pacifism 

For sacrificing courage. 

The same law 
Has been from the beginning for both lamb 
And lion : that a little child shall lead them. 
The happiest, mightiest citizen this side 
Eternal Heaven, whither we are bound. 
Is the imaginative grown-up child, 
Unswerved by argument, uncow'd by cynic, 

62 



MILITANT PEACE 

With not a doubt of life's transcendency, 

The wise fool hero of the universe, 

Bearing within his undiscouraged heart 

The living, throbbing, fateful future ! Watch him ; 

You meet him everywhere : but yesterday 

A blundering babe : today those infant dreams 

The child by perseverance brings to pass. 

And is admitted to the fellowship 

Of other mighty children who once thought 

Such nonsense, and who now are working out 

Together their combined progressive dream, 

Wliich these call Socialism, those Industrial 

Democracy; but by whatever name. 

It is the Kingdom of Heaven among men, 

The burden of the prophets, the desire 

Of all the ages, as personified 

In Jesus, its Chief Hero! Let it come! 

The Master Dreamer's Dream ! Let it come true ! 

Opposing might with might and skill with skill, 

Invention with invention, undismay'd 

By any cruel test of courage devised 

Or possible to be devised by man. 

The Great Deliverer works out through strife 

Our unifying and deliverance 

From war to peace, in the long, slow, sure way 

Of daily discipline and practical 

Proceedure, trying out by fire and flood 

And time and disappointment all our plans 

And projects, with a view to every risk 

Of every kind that human institutions 

Must meet: that all may hold firm in that hour 

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BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

When the great testing comes. For it must come. 
To men and nations it is ever arriving 
And on the way. And he who is himself. 
And not ashamed to be the child he was 
Before he leam'd to doubt, he best shall stand 
In the great disaster. As I wish to meet 
Each moment of decision when to act 
Is destiny, I keep to all the world 
An open mind and friendly heart, forgiving 
And being forgiven, that no bitterness 
May rise within me then to over-rule 
The choice I ought to make who am a child 
And comrade of the Highest . For I know 
That without great care to be ever watchful 
I cannot trust myself to be the man 
I ought to be, and that I dared believe 
The little boy would surely grow into. 
God help me not to disappoint the child ! 
For I am still the same child I was then. 
Who thought he must become so different 
From what he seem'd, but is content to stay 
His unsophisticated singular self, 
Avshamed of all the guile he could not learn. 
Yet cannot quite discard, — ingenuous, 
Hating hypocrisy with all his soul, 
While still detecting hourly in his actions, 
And in his speech, and in his secret thoughts. 
Traces of every form of every sin. 
Inherited and acquired, which weakens man 
And drives him and delays him in his efforts 
To work out some improvement in himself. 

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MILITANT PEACE 

And all men everywhere are much like me; 
And I am much like all men everywhere; 
No better and no worse, considering 
Their birth and mine, my opportunities 
And theirs. Our fortunes are inseparable ; 
We rise or fall together; and our children 
Come handicapt to their inheritance 
By every law we break, or helpt by laws 
Kept sacred. What affects one affects all. 
Therefore since I cannot be, tho I try. 
The man I nevertheless must try to be, 
I am that irrepressible child who did 
Escort swell funerals beside the hearse. 
Or with the band, before the solemn Templars, 
The Knights of Pythias, or such grand heroes, 
A-stretching legs and stepping to the drum 
With tireless feet ! They threaten'd him, they spankt. 
They coaxt; but undissuaded he marcht on. 
Perhaps a half a block away, but marcht ! 
They drove him to the sidewalk from the street; 
Policemen by the hand convoy'd him home; 
His mother put him in his sister's dresses; 
In nightgown; tied him to the bed. He escaped! — 
And proudly with the bodyguard marcht on 
Beside the slow-drawn hearse. What did he care — 
What cares he now — that he was chased away? 
Did he stay frighten'd? He came back proud still. 
And did his share of the marching, step by step. 
With soulful serious long strides to the grave. 
Then back at quickstep! — still beside the band! — 
The band ! — the band ! — Oh, the melodious band ! — 

65 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

The military music! — how I loved it! — 
How love it yet! And may it charm me still. 
When to the long roll of the deep dead march 
I watch them bear my body to the grave. 
The child knew not if he was being cheated ; 
'Twas all majestic, sweet and wonderful, 
Past comprehension to his credulous mind. 
Unknown to him the tricks of the male nature, 
The sordid vanity behind it all, 
The nasty foul-mouth'd evil-hearted brute 
That mar'd the music in so many ears, — 
Not then in mine ; for I was a sweet babe. 
Oblivious of discord, hearing none 
In my then sinless heart as now, a sinful 
Apologist for a sinful race, I must. 
Oh, I am glad the little child was happy! 
It satisfied the yearnings of his breast 
For what it seem'd to be, noble, refined, 
Immortal ! And it stirs him yet to think 
How beautiful it was — how far beyond. 
In his then undeveloped taste, the poor 
Cheap silly claptrap ragtime of the hour! 
Perhaps because he loved their music so: 
Perhaps because he would not be dissuaded 
From following the band : perhaps because 
He was so laughably sincere and simple: 
Those men liked him — he knew they did — they must- 
They could not help but like him — they envied him — 
They blest the boy ! They saw how he was there 
In God's name, as a valorous man, to do 
His part, and that he did it well, on fire 

66 



MILITANT PEACE 

With an inherent and unquenchable 
Enthusiasm — little flag on shoulder, 
Eyes all delight! Oh, now, through all my toil. 
My stem relentless hard self-discipline. 
Whatever else I seem, I still, with laughter 
And with contagious faith, am that same child, — 
The same unconquerable enthusiast 
That I was then, and hope I still shall be 
Down to my latest years ; in full accord 
With all the good in man; intolerant 
Of any evil ; yet more patient, strong 
And masterful to do with brotherly 
Forbearance my persistent little part. 
The martial spirit in me is still strong; 
And I am marching to the music now 
As I march'd then, — sometimes behind the hearse, 
Struggling to keep the grief out of my face. 
But marching on. I still delight in crowds, 
In uniforms and military pomp; 
In all brave men and measures I still rejoice, — 
Am not yet tired of sweet sounds finger'd in tune 
And stept to in deep earnest ! I need not 
Array my form proudly in soldier's garb; 
Overalls or plain citizen's attire 
Suffice me. For while young at heart as then, 
I grow mature in mind, steadfast in purpose, 
More reasonable and willing to be led 
By wiser counsels to the furtherance 
Of better plans, in the straight narrow path 
Of rectitude and loving sacrifice. 
From which I hanker less and less to stray. 

67 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

And so I live my plain old-fashion'd life. 

Pleased with such ordinary simple joys 

As come to men at work in shop or field, 

Or at nightfall returning, or going forth 

At daybreak, to and from their homely tasks, 

Cheer'd by the presence of dear hearts that care. 

Tho warlike in my spirit, I am at peace 

With all safe men. Only against injustice — 

Against crime and its causes — am I at war. 

As I have fought with fists, I could with weapons, 

If home and love demanded, — could perish fighting 

Beside true neighbors in defense of what 

To me is principle ! Is life so sweet, 

Is peace so precious, yet not worth defending? 

For without liberty there were no peace. 

And life would be a burden. Peace or war. 

To live and die in a great cause is great ! — 

To exercise just rights, and nobly dare 

Be to the world all meanings of God's love, — 

No less of His stern justice and swift wrath 

Than of His deep long-suffering compassion, — 

Exemplifying in our zeal for man 

The Gospel of the militant Son of God, 

The Bravest of the Bravest of the Brave. 

If His aggressive sanity has been 

Distorted every way, love sets Him right 

Before a hopelessly divided world. 

In His eternal-minded, all-inclusive 

Unity and completeness the One Teacher 

Of all the race in Whom all can agree. 



MILITANT PEACE 

Peace is the great proposal. Shall we live it? 
God's peace was in the world from the beginning; 
And will be here unto the end of time. 
Is man to set up some peace of his own? 
Peace, and yet not God's peace, is he to have? 
What kind of peace, proud man? What kind of peace? 
The only peace I know is of the heart; 
War cannot rob me of it, it is here; 
I feel it like a wine through all my blood : 
A living, throbbing, powerful, militant peace! 
A peace that soothes my weary mind to rest. 
A satisfying peace, the peace of God, 
That passeth knowledge. All the peace there is. 
Or ever was or can be. Heavenly peace. 
Except a man have that peace he hath war! 
War in himself and war against mankind ! 
Oh, mighty is the man whose strength is peace: 
The man of peace blest with a warrior soul ! 
In battle there is peace if God be there ; 
And there God is if in the heart is peace. 
Many have found Him there who did not know. 
And might not else have leam'd, what Jesus meant. 
Who show'd us plainly and bequeath'd to us 
That peace which is as far above man's thought 
As Heaven is above the earth. I 've read 
The morbid doubts and idle questionings 
That rob us of our birthright. But for me. 
As for that child, the ardent boy I was, 
We may seem simple to believe so much, — 
To be still gospel-hearted, when so many 

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Have thrown away old golden thoughts for bright 
New jingling German brass, — but 0, serene, 
My soul! — crusader for no sepulcher: 
Soldier of no cheap fortune : seeking not 
Contemporary and contemptible fame: 
Still undissuaded, hold thyself in line, 
With lowly, clean, devoted, militant Christians, 
And march on in the service of thy King ! 
Step to the music that was bom in thee, 
eager heart! — still steadfast to the end. 
Tho to the grave thou goest, go in earnest; 
Go trusting in thy Maker and thy God; 
Go as a little child; as a strong youth; 
As a young man and as a just man go ; 
A patriarch, stoop'd with toil, and white and wrinkled 
With many years, go to thy grave alone. 
It shall be well with thee, and with all those 
Who put their trust in Him. He in that hour 
Shall welcome thee; therefore march on in peace. 
At quickstep shall thy spirit issue thence, 
Review'd by clouds of witnesses ! In Heaven's 
Bright army, from victorious wars returning, 
Thou in the midst of everlasting peace 
Wilt there be met by loved ones whom to see 
Were of itself reward enough for all 
Thy trials here on earth. Yet Christ our Captain 
Is there, with God our Father and our King, 
In Whose great armies here we served, for Whom 
We died in action, laying down at last 
Our earthly life, to take up Life with Him 
In Heaven, the Capital of the Universe. 

70 



HOME, NEIGHBORHOOD, FAITH, FRIENDSHIP 



HOME, NEIGHBORHOOD, FAITH, FRIENDSHIP 



BUILD THE DAMS ! 

One voice from up Stillwater, 

Down the valley that was flooded, 
Sends you a neighbor's greeting, 
At a time when men are weak ! 
For parent, son and daughter 
These pulses throb red-blooded! 
There must be no defeating 

Of this project! Let me speak - 
At God's pleasure, 
In full measure. 
For your treasure 
Let me speak! 
Are we freak — 
Are we foolish — in our dotage — 
That we hesitate like heathen. 
In the wake of wide disaster, 
At such testing-time as this? 
Shall we value farm and cottage, 
A mere place to toil and breathe in! 
Tho 'twere gold and alabaster — 
The it shelter'd every bliss — 
73 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

Shall we measure 
All our treasure 
By mere pleasure? 
What were bliss. 
If we miss 
Being noble men and women. 
Worthier than our possessions ! 

What were house and farm and future, 
If we fail before the Lord ! — 
If our homes make us inhuman ! — 
If acres crush these passions 
WTiich dignify our nature ! 
Can we as men afford 
At our pleasure 
Thus to measure 
Out our treasure 
To, or hoard 
From, the Lord! — 
Face our generous Creator 

With a bargain-seeking caution? — 
Cheat the good God of a duty 
Which we owe Him, every one? 
What will you say when later 

— But too late! — that rushing ocean 
Descends upon the beaut)' 
Of that city, where your son 
Or your daughter 
In that slaughter 
By Stillwater 
Is undone! — 
Will you run 

74 



BUILD THE DAMS! 

To the rescue? Who will ask you? 
You will know, when all is over! 
Base abject ! In your weakness, 

Will you then have faith in prayer? 
Ah! — for memory will task you: 

"Tho you saved your corn and clover. 
Your heart now faints for sickness 
At the thought (if think you dare!) 
That you waited ! — 
Hesitated ! — 

Scolded ! — hated ! — 
Were not fair!" 
Where, then, — where 
Will you go for consolation? — 
When the innocent have perish'd ! 
God is tenderly forgiving. 
And still patient with us all; 
But beneath self-condemnation 
The tobacco crop you cherish'd, 
With house and farm and saving. 
Will seem pitifully small, 
When you measure 
Then your pleasure 
By stale treasure ! 
Like a pall 
Truth will fall! 
Earth will crush you! Oh, self-hater! 
You were doom'd from that cheap hour 
When you thought in terms of taxes! — 
When you loved with less than life! 
For the just Administrator, 
75 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

Unchanged in word and power. 
When man's vigilance relaxes, 
Tho he gain by sordid strife, — 
The Creator, 
Sooner, later. 
Is Testator 
Of your life. 
Child and wife. 
Home and fortune. Man, how dare you. 
With so many lives depending 
On your kindliness and courage, 
Ah, how dare you urge low claim ! 
For the Voice shall say, "Where were you? 
You were getting, saving, spending: 
Time demands a full demurrage: 
On your soul rests all the blame; 
For you waited. 
Hesitated, 
Till, belated. 
And in shame. 
Yes, you came." 



WHAT TO ME 



What is my freedom to me 
While my brother is not free! 
How mean my happiness 
That does not lift him and bless! 
A Christian, I? 'Tis a sham. 
If no one is glad that I am ! 
I acknov/ledge my self-distrust: 
76 



WHAT TO ME! 

God! — that I were just! 
When my brother sins I see it; 
But my sin! — do I flee it? 

Be it with shame confest, 

1 never have done my best. 
Yet whatever else my sin, 
A doubter I have not been; 
I have tried, have fail'd, 
Strived harder and not prevail'd. 
But because with might and main 
I strived when strife seem'd vain, 
And would not cease to trust 
God and believe Him just, 

I shall have infinite chances 
To make divine advances. 
And in Eternal Time 
Soar where I could not climb ! 
Conscious development 
Keeps me brisk and content; 
My undiscouraged eyes 
Covet no mortal prize; 
These busy feet pursue 
So swiftly nothing new; 
The labor of my hands 
God sees and understands. 
He knows that if I could 
Master my fate I would; 
And His ungrudging love 
Will give all I fail of. 
My faith, hope, love are His. 
How magnanimous God is ! 
77 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 



GO, THEREFORE 

If I had a houseful of children. 
But one was lost or had died, 

Till I found the babe of my bosom 
I could not feel satisfied. 

Had I of sons and daughters 
More than one father's share, 

No comforts could take their places; 
Love would have none to spare. 

Sin, with subtle persistence. 

Might cause my home to mourn; 

But with pleading and full forgiveness 
I must tenderly counsel and yearn. 

So in the heart of our Father 
The least and lowest of men 

Hath equal place with the upright, 
Tho fallen again and again; 

And I can only please Him 

As I enter with Christ that care 

Which makes me my brother's keeper. 
Always and everywhere; 

Ever and without ceasing 

To seek the lost, and to pray: 

Father, Thy heavenly purpose 
On earth be done alway. 

78 



HOME, NEIGHBORHOOD, FAITH, FRIENDSHIP 



THE LIVING FLAG 

Robed in the Stars and Stripes, 
Queen Edith ! Forth stept she, 

An emotional rhythmic statue 
Of the Goddess of Liberty ! 

Down over the Flag of the Free 

Falls her full dark hair: 
When was the Star-Spangled Banner, 

On sea or land, so fair! 

To the music of the Hymn, 

By expressional figure and face, 

She describes that perilous night, 
Floating and flowing with grace. 

An undulatory Standard, 

O'er the ramparts in the breeze ! 

Our hearts are there in the fortress ! 
Our eyes look over the seas — 

There ! Still there ! See it wave — 
Now hiding, now revealing her, 

(Bright Colors of the true and the brave!) 
Their beautiful Interpreter! 

And was that Carrie's voice, 
In full sustain'd soprano telling 

The story of that anxious night. 
With the Flag falling and swelling? 

79 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

Proud Nation, that can guard such girls 

To be the mothers of men ! 
May no wars in the future 

Cause woman anguish again! 

In mutual trust let nations. 

The arts of peace pursuing. 
Join hands and hearts and flags and marts 

In noble deeds worth doing! 

Till under One Living Standard 
The white dove folds her wings: 

One Nation, the Kingdom of Heaven ! 
One Ruler, the King of Kings ! 



THE WATCHER 

Any evening, any hour. 
At the twilight in the tower. 
Silhouetted on the sky. 
Seems to every passer-by 
Someone standing looking forth. 
To the south, or to the north. 
'Tis the bell that calls to prayer. 
Hanging in the belfry there; 
But the thoughtful heart will see 
A picture of life's tragedy : 
Someone standing — standing yet — 
Leaning o'er the parapet, 
Watching, waiting, yearning still 
For who should come that never will, 
80 



SONNETS 



TO MY PASTOR, ALVA MARTIN KERR 



NOVEMBER FIRST 

Our own once more come back to us in power ! 
Strong teacher, by the force of love commanding 
God's willing ones, we have desired this hour; 
And He Whose goodness baffles understanding 

Hath given us our wish; and we have heard 
Again that friendly voice, and seen that face 
Which like a phoenix from the burning Word, 
Or spirit from the Blest with deathless grace 

On All Saints' Day, hath come our hearts to search; 
And we have yielded gladly to the spell 
Which we cannot explain; and as a church 

Are risen to know and do God's blessed will. 
What wilt thou say? — if He shall whisper: Son, 
Arise; be strong; thy work here is not done. 

JANUARY SNOWSTORM 



Last night I trudged to town in the deep snow. 
I seem'd the only one of all my race 
In all the world. Soft through the still cold air 
Fine flakes were falling yet. Some kist my face. 

I could not see them, but I knew them fair. 
They were my little guardian angels there, 
Lest I should founder in some lonely place 
Along the unbroken road, and none know where. 
81 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

With glorious exhilerating snow 

The town was hush'd. I saw thy gleaming light. 
And in my joyous freedom thought of thee, 

Shut in from robust romp, wild to be free, 
While thousands who at will can come and go 
Hug fires and shudder at the winter night. 



Ray Anewalt made public sale by crier. 
Of livestock and farm tools ; for he intends 
Moving to town ; and it was my desire 
To be on hand all day with neighbors and friends 

And help keep bidding lively if I could. 

The crowd stay'd in the strip shed round the fire, 
Laughing and cutting up, while a few stood — 
I with them — in the gusty log bam. Good! 

I got some extra bargains fair and square: 
A big young gentle iron-gray work mare, 
A lot of harness, pitchfork, saw, clamp, chains. 

And don't know what all. Standing so long there, 
I frosted both my feet; now for my pains 
I '11 have another siege of seven-year chilblains! 



ra 

Through snow I bounced home, high on the broad back 
Of my big prancing prize ! Her foretop tost, 
She snift and snorted at the flying frost. 
Yet to the halter bow'd her arched neck, 

82 



SONNETS 

And slept along with ease, making a track 

From side to side, where roads might have been lost 
But for the fences. Now the brook bridge we crost, 
Enter'd the lane, and soon at the feed-rack 

In warm straw-bedded stall I tum'd her loose, 
Comfortable and affectionate, — did my feeding. 
And milkt my cows. By that time I was about 

As sleepy as an old cat; but, no use: 

Gertrude had made the butter, and we were needing 
Some groceries from town. I ate, and started out. 



IV 

Unless I have a horse that should be shod, 

I seldom loaf at Johnny's blacksmith shop 

Warm days, where idle men are joking and chaffing. 

But last night, it would not have seem'd so odd 
To hang around the grocery, or stop 

Where wags lounge talking and spitting, smoking and 
laughing. 

Tired and bewilder'd with the all-day storm, 

I felt that I could settle down and nod 
By any fire, so it was cozy and warm. 

And I could snooze forgetful of the cold. 

I hate stink of tobacco on my person ; 
But I believe last night I could have roU'd 

Under a bar-room stove, and snored sweet-soul'd, 

Where drunken blab-mouth bums were slandering and 
cursing. 



83 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 



Thank Heaven there has been no boozing-place 
In Pleasant Hill these twenty years and more ; 
And may there never be such foul disgrace 
Brought on us by that impudent few-score 

Of boastful soaks and swaggerers who swore 
They'd fetch out enough voters of their kind 
To force it through ! Our nauseous rank spitoon, 
Vile with tobacco drool from quid in cheek, 

Is spew enough without their pukey saloon. 
That may not sound quite pious and rifined, 
But curse the swinish business! — when I speak, 

I 'U use words that convey facts to the mind. 
God give you strength to rise and biff the beast 
Squarely between the blinks a few more times at least ! 



VI 

After my basketful of butter had been 
Delivered as usual to our customers, 
I tum'd for home. Had I been wrapt in furs, 
I might have dropt off sound asleep there in 

The deep soft snow, a comfortable grin 
Frozen across my face. Not a breath stirs, 
Nor flake falls. The retiring villagers 
Darken their homes. A few stars now begin 

To sparkle from between drift fields of mist : 
I watch them peep and disappear, as heavily 
The frozen river I cross, and climb up Lauver's Hill. 

84 



SONNETS 

It seem'd I never felt the world so still. 

At last I heard our spring tinkle over its gravelly 
Bed; and in mine I slept, luU'd by its chime to rest. 



VII 

This afternoon the carrier, long delay'd. 

Left in our box this letter fraught with pain; 
This yearning cry that doth its wish obtain, 
Not youth, but manly fortitude instead ; 

The boy heart guided by the man's wise head; 
Sad-seeming life enlighten'd and made plain. 
Where every loss hath its peculiar gain. 
And disciplined affections learn to spread 

The all-uniting Gospel. Under deep frost 
A million summers wave ! So surely thou 
Hast or shalt have with wildest leaping yet 

Thy irrepressible boyhood ! Nothing is lost 
In the glad Universe of God. Even now 
Thy valor is a priceless coronet. 



VIII 

You cannot serve me better than to love me; 
You cannot love me better than to show. 
As you have shown me here, that hour of woe 
When strong men most need friendship. Only prove me, 

'Tis all I ask of the sweet Heaven above me ; 
'Tis all we of each other here can know : 
That we proved faithful, and in love dared grow. 
Scorning despair! Speak to thy heart: say of me, 

85 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

"He is my steadfast friend." Our griefs help build 
Some noble part of the great Kingdom of Heaven, 
Which cannot be destroyed. God is well pleased 

When gentle souls in anguish thus are still'd 
One with another and their trials eased 
By confidences mutually given. 



PRAYERS FOR VIRGINIA TO SAY 



Morning again! I am awake 
To live this day for Jesus' sake. 
Dear Savior, guide me safely through 
The happiest day I ever knew. 

Happy, because for Thee I live. 

And quickly, tenderly forgive. 

Love and obey my parents dear. 

And wrong thoughts, words and actions fear. 

holy angels, guard this day 
Each little child upon its way, 
And let no evil thing befall 
Their pure sweet innocence at all. 

So may my hours in good be spent. 
Until at night I come content, 
Living this earnest prayer I 've said. 
To lay me in my little bed. 
86 



PRAYERS FOR VIRGINIA 



II 

From morning until night, all day, 
God's little child I run and play; 
For while my heart to Him is true, 
I hardly think of what I do. 

'Tis because Jesus is with me, 
That I can feel so glad and free; 
With me about my play He goes, 
And all I think and do He knows. 

I could not wish, Lord, to offend 
So kind, so true, so dear a friend; 
When I have cross and naughty been. 
Make me feel sorry for my sin. 

And when I 've tried and tried, and then 
Still done the same wrong things again, 
And Thou has loved me and been true, 
So may I love my playmates, too. 

I wish not ever to forget 
That I may be forgiven yet, 
However wayward I have been. 
If I am sorry for my sin. 

But I must keep a loving heart, 
If I would stay, Lord, where Thou art; 
Must tenderly forgiving be ; 
Then shall it all be well with me. 
87 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 



III 

Safe within my little bed, 
On Jesus' breast I lay my head; 
His happy child I 've tried to be ; 
Now while I sleep He cares for me. 

So till I wake at morning light, 
And day by day and night by night. 
All my life long, year after year. 
The gentle Savior watches near. 

Each day to me the Christ is bom; 
Each day dawns new the Easter mom; 
For while I trust God's loving care, 
I find my Heaven everywhere. 

Dear Lord, I pray, let not depart 
Thy holy Sabbath from my heart; 
But pure and kind each day I 'd be, 
Gireful because Christ cares for me. 



CHRISTIAN FELLOWSHIP 

How swiftly the delightful days have flown. 
Since we so pleasantly, so briefly met! 

The memory of this quaint country home 
I shall not soon forget. 

Even in Heaven, when for me life ends. 
There will I fondly treasure in my heart 



HOME, NEIGHBORHOOD, FAITH, FRIENDSHIP 

The influence of these kind Christian friends, 
From whom I now must part. 

When, at the close of each brief earthly day, 
I at God's mercy seat shall kneel in prayer. 

And for the friends I love, in secret pray. 
These I'll remember there. 

The day will come when time shall be no more; 

When friends shall meet with friends not thus to sever. 
There we shall join God's praise. Be glad, therefore! 

We part, but not forever. 



CAT TALES TOLD BY TINY GIRUES 

Once 'ey was a pretty 'ittie kitty 

Lived wiv its mamma in a biggie, biggie city; 

An' its naughty mamma wouldn' give it any tittie; 

An' it cwied, an' it cwied, an' it cwied, an' it cwied; 

An' nen, — w'y nen, — w'y nen, — it died. 

Oh ! wasn' 'at a drea'ful, drea'ful pity 

For ne poor 'ittie bittie pretty kitty? 



Free 'ittol tittens, two sissers an' a bruwer, 
Wented to town wif ner arms awound each uwer, 
A-lookin' an' a-lookin' an' a-lookin' for ner muwer. 
An' nen, when ner saw'd her, ner wun'd fas' 's ner tould. 
An' tell'd her ner beedhave nerselves an' ack awfu* dood, 
While her was wented to town for some mice. 
Oh, wasn' nem free 'ittol tittens nice? 

89 



HOME, NEIGHBORHOOD, FAITH, FRIENDSHIP 



THE DIVINE WARFARE 

In the teeth of every temptation without, 

Conscious of wayward passions within, 
I have fought and conquer'd and grown more stout 
Against besetting implacable doubt, 

Which keeps the way open for sin; 
And tho I am not yet divinely devout, 

I have only begun to begin ! 

There is time; and to fight is to win! 
— Then the shout! 



TREE SPARROWS IN FEBRUARY 

Chirping sparrows in the bam. 

Of a wintry day, 
When I go to feed my stock. 

Laugh chill thoughts away. 
"Thank you, sir, for seeds," they sing, 
"We are waiting here for Spring — 

Are we welcome, pray? 
Or do you object to guests 
Who have neither food nor nests. 

If uninvited they?" 

Nay, my merry birdies, nay! 
For I love each happy creature 

God hath lent us for our pleasure; 
Houseless birds, ye are the Lord's, — 

Come, and share my treasure I 
90 



TREE SPARROWS IN FEBRUARY 

Flit along the beams and pick, 

Hop beneath the rafter; 
All I ask is cheerful chirps; 

Food is what ye 're after ! 
"Thank you, sir, for seeds," they say, 
" Which we find among your hay ! " 

I respond with laughter, 
Saying, welcome, jolly guests. 
In brown tailcoats and furry vests, — 

Each gay pot-bellied grafter 

Banquets at my expense hereafter! 
I am waiting, too, for April; 

But 'tis blustering snowy weather; 
Fly about the barn and shout! — 

We will wait together. 

Winter now will soon be gone. 

Cold will soon be over. 
Then glad Spring home will bring 

Many a lyric lover. 
All about my Sweetheart's farm 
Wrens will build when days are warm, 

Phoebes here seek cover; 
Starlings and fieldlarks will mate, 
Calling early, calling late. 

In swamps and upland clover; 

And the noisy moonlight plover. 
Wheeling round o'er the ground. 

Where fresh earth is broken. 
Will begin their sad sea-sound. 

Sweeter heard than spoken. 
91 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

Stay, then, with your busy voices. 

Perch and chirp and flit; 
Arthur has a sparrow-house; 

You shall build in it. 
Minstrels pay well their way. 
Singing, as I hope you may, 

When the weather's fit. 
And you rude uproarious elves 
Jubilantly sun yourselves. 

Where you used to sit, 

In shrubbery, twittering as you lit. 
Chirping, chirping, chirping, chirping, — 

Twittering as you curved away, 
And returning, — fluttering, chirping, 

All the livelong day ! 

Fly away, my flock, my song. 

My little birds, go free ! 
Fly where song can do no wrong. 

Wherever that may be ; 
Fly to open hearts and enter. 
From the snowy, stormy winter, 

Bearing love from me ! 
Go and flutter in and out 
And back and forth and all about! 

He Who holds the key 

To all kind hearts, will welcome thee ! 
Go requite them with the Spirit 

Of Immortal Pleasure, reaching 
Far beyond thy lowly merit 

And thy simple teaching. 
92 



HOME, NEIGHBORHOOD, FAITH, FRIENDSHIP 



GOLDEN SCARS 

My books by little hands are torn; 

My chairs are scratcht by little shoes. 
little shoes, too soon outworn ! 
Dear little hands, too soon forlorn ! 

My books and chairs were made to use; 
And what wise use could wiser be 
Than to give joy, my babe, to thee ! 

Before she went whom they call dead, 
She brought these old dry asters in. 

Arranged them in the vase and said, 

"Don't take them down," and shook her head, 
She loved them; and they still have been 

With living flowers, year after year. 

Upon the fireplace mantel here. 

The days may come when I shall prize 
This page by Virgie's fingers mar'd, 

As now the mist will blur my eyes. 
Seeing this chair by Edith scar'd. 
Dear little Edie! 'Twould be hard 

Now, since she runs no more about. 

To see these tokens polish'd out. 

These humble floors, by baby feet 

Made consecrated floors of Heaven, — 
These walls — will never more repeat 
Her pretty prattle. Through cold and heat 
Long ten years daily ageward driven, 
93 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

I reach back through the empty past, 
To where she kist me and loved me last. 

If our proud hearts these many years 

Have been and still must wounded be, 
From sinful doubts and sordid fears 
They tenderer have been kept with tears. 
To joy distiird, sweet babe, for thee; 
And not to shirk heartbreaking pain 
We 'd wish those glad times back again. 

O Thou Who wast on Calvery mar'd. 
That we might share Thy living faith ! 

No heavy grief shall be too hard 

For Thee to bear with us through death 
To where our gentle Angel hath 

These ten years been at home, while we 

Toil'd on together trusting Thee. 



CANZONE 

Grieve not above this body when it dies; 

Canst thou not enter with me into that Peace 
Which waits the spirit's birth, when all the Skies 

Shall open to receive me? Shall I cease, 
And be no more? Then wherefore grieve, sweet eyes! 

An hour, a week, a year, comes thy release; 
Go forward, then, to meet thy Lord with me ; 
This was thy love's poor house ; this was not he. 
But Oh! — if I lost thee! — my light! — if I lost thee! 

94 



HOME, NEIGHBORHOOD, FAITH, FRIENDSHIP 



DIVINE GUIDANCE 

My passions are too full and strong: 

It does no good for me to fight them: 
To let bad habits lead me wrong, 

Then foolishly expect to right them. 
Desire will get the best of me. 

Unless each moment, hour by hour, 
I dominate as destiny, 

And rule my life with moral power. 
But where to get that strength benign, 

To do as I well know I should? 
Creator, the desire is Thine, 

Thy vigor, too, must make it good; 
The wisdom and the will are one, 
To see and do what must be done. 

To know the Ruler just and kind. 

And then deny His rule, were treason. 
I therefore yield my finite mind 

To be control'd by infinite Reason. 
If happiness before me lies, 

Or tragic sorrow, I know not; 
But there shall be no compromise; 

I am abiding by my lot. 
Against Thy will I dare not go. 

But cling to Thee and struggle on, 
Knowing, as past all doubt I know. 

My face is toward the Eternal Dawn; 
And I shall find, as I have found. 
He masters most who is most bound. 
9S 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 



UNIVERSAL WONDER 

After the evening prayers are said, 
And my loved ones are snug in bed, 
I turn down low the kitchen light. 
Visit the stable for the night. 
Then, with snufft lantern swung in hand. 
Sometimes a long, long while I'll stand. 
And watch the solemn starry scene. 
Wondering what it all may mean ! 

Or if the moon unclouded blends 
With the blue deep as she ascends. 
Or clouded now, now doubly cheers 
The rapt soul as she reappears! — 
Or if the night be thick and dark. 
And I can only pause and hark: 
Snowing or raining, it may be, — 
All, all is marvellous to me ! 

How many of my fellow creatures 
Grow docile to those voiceless teachers. 
As year by year, while ages roll. 
Expands the mind that reads yon scroll ! 
How many, anguishing with grief, 
Have in that silence found relief! 
What promises unspeakable 
Still those inspiring prophets tell ! 

Those desert distances we fear ! 

But ah, what shifting scenes are here! 

96 



UNIVERSAL WONDER 

Qouds bring the grandeur of all skies 
Home to our grief-dim spirit eyes. 
Even when they shut the calm stars out, 
They rest our faith, reprove our doubt. 
And by all contrasts, day and night, 
They multiply the joys of sight ! 

All beauty that inspires my breast 
Is Love to love made manifest. 
Not clouds nor distance, time nor death. 
To aught but God's love witnesseth. 
How glorious and fair through tears 
The beauty of the Christ appears ! 
And Heaven, when our loved ones die. 
Seems to the suffering heart how nigh ! 

I step out on a still clear night. 

And look up at the stars ! Their light. 

Suddenly seen far shining there. 

Thrills me with pleasure ! I stand and stare. 

Speechless ! Breathing the Universe 

Into my soul, I seem, in my course. 

One with all those stars I see. 

Created, like them, God, for Thee ! 

Bright stars, I am a human heart ; 
I cannot dwell, as you, apart 
From human influences yonder 
In the deep void. I would not sunder 
My soul from erring fellow mortals. 
Man's beauty more my spirit startles, 

97 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

When I consider his bright future. 
Than all the wondrousness of nature I 



For all mankind my bosom heaves: 
For him that joys, for him that grieves, 
I feel an intimate concern, 
To help, to counsel, and to warn. 
Uplifted through the night by stars, 
I see them at their toils and wars : 
Sinful, but slowly conquering wrong; 
And Oh, I wonder. Lord, how long! 

In them, through ages of distress, 
I wonder at Thy faithfulness ! 
And how, from vice and ignorance yet. 
The worst must all that past forget ! 
Doubtless in other worlds men grieve. 
Rejoice in hope, fail, yet achieve. 
And are, as we, made strong thereby, 
To toil, to suffer, and to die. 

Lovers, perhaps, who share God's bliss 
In other worlds, beholding this. 
Are wondering in transport deep. 
While with my family I sleep, 
What splendid sweet display of spheres 
To their unclouded sight appears. 
And send to me their love divine. 
Across the vast, as I send mine! 



98 



SONNET AND OTHER VERSES 



TO BERTHA 



To gentle Bertha, in that place of pain. 

We send our love, with anxious hearts that blend 

In supplication, that the Christ may lend 

His tender strength to her whom we would fain 

Help with our futile hands. For she hath lain 
Too many times near that mysterious End, 
Which we, in fear of losing our sweet friend, 
So ignorantly dread. Yet doth she gain. 

With each descent near to the gates of Death, 
More courage, with fine Christian fortitude. 
To face hard life anew; in a strange place 

To make new friends ; inspire old friends with faith ; 
And help us all be simply kind and good, 
Seeing in such as she our Savior's face. 



II 

Go, little Harbingers of Spring, 
Your smiles to Bertha's bedside bring! 
Sweet Bertha, bearing long distress 
With unembitter'd gentleness. 
To those dear tired eyes of hers 
Hasten, little Harbingers! 
Pickt by loving hands at home. 
From the leafless woods you come, 
99 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

By fierce engines of man's thought 
Over plains and mountains brought. 
In your modest beauty saying, 
" Spring will not be long delaying ! " 

Dost recall, far friend, the day 

We wander'd through the woods of May, 

With the children, — happy hours! — 

By Stillwater, gathering flowers? 

We will soon be glad again 

To wander through the woods as then ; 

And the flowers we gather there 

Will, as those, be fresh and fair; 

And thy gracious presence will 

By our side go with us still. 

In the deep-stored memory, 

A sacred consciousness of thee. 

As by Galilee Man's Friend 

Walk'd in love, so to the End 

We with Him and one another 

Shall in spirit walk together. 

Those whom Christ hath join'd in heart 

Time and distance cannot part; 

Nor death His love obliterate. 

Whose love is life. Whose life is fate. 

God give us grace to see it so. 

While friends and seasons come and go. 

Till side by side in wondering talk 

Through groves of Paradise we walk. 



100 



SONNETS 



RUPERT BROOKE 



Here might have been — here was — here is, indeed, 
A gentle hero of wise mascuhne soul. 
Our friend and brother. All men own him now. 
And proudly. There 's his likeness. Read here how 

He perish'd paying part of the blood toll 

For Freedom's progress in her hour of need. 
Exacted by barbarians crazed with greed 
Of empire. He abhor'd their state control 

Over the sacred character — could not bow 
To the crass fraud himself, neither allow 
Hordes to impose it on the nations. Roll 

That frightful stone up hill, as was decreed 
In Berlin, ye misguided, — back on them 
Comes guilt's dread avalanche to utterly condemn ! 



LUSITANIA 

The murderer of Belgium suicides. 
Sinking her scuttled honor in the sea! 
Not Freedom has gone down; but Germany, 
Disgraced beneath all nations, foully hides 

Her awful record! — while triumphant rides. 
Bearing a charmed life, more and more free, 
Toward Peace, the noble ship Humanity, 
Freighted with Love and Hope, by winds and tides 

Borne onward ! For those poor misguided fools. 
Those galley slaves of that black privateer, 
Not hatred nor revenge. Comrades, befit 

101 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

The modern mind, but judgement ! They in schools 
Were warpt from earliest childhood thus to sneer 
At all but Germans. Pity the half-wit. 



YET WILL I TRUST HIM 

The anguish of these months of pain 

Seems more sometimes than strength can bear, 
So limited my human brain, 

So crusht my life with care. 

Helpless the day's demands to meet, 

Anxious to meet them as before. 
From lifelong failure and defeat 

I now can strive no more. 

But God will lead me wisely on, 

Through many a sad and joyous birth. 

Till I, from joy and sorrow gone. 
Am perish'd from the earth. 

Gone into Everlasting Love, 

Where needs not pain nor grief nor death 
His life in me to purge and prove 

To the last faithful breath. 

Father, let me hear Thy voice 
In sunset bush and whispering tree ! 

Tho sorrowing, I still rejoice 
To walk in pain with Thee. 

102 



SONNETS 



IN TRAVAIL OF SOUL 



So thin and high the clouds, they seem to soar 
Beyond the moon, among the stars, in Heaven! 
Angelic hosts, on errand free, not driven 
By upper current urging evermore 

Their mindless will, but winging toward some shore 
Of that blue spacious Altitude, where not even 
And morn succeed, nor twelvemonths, nor the seven 
Familiar days, nor echo from the roar 

Of distant sunbiith comes, but an eternal 
Silence. Oh, that my spirit might partake 
Of that vast hush — that I here might become 

A happy pilgrim, free from all these carnal 
Desires and earthly passions that would break 
The stubborn hold on Him Who is my Home ! 



II 

I AM a rapturous despairing throb 

Of the great heart of Love ! God's human veins, 
Through us He pours His Life, and all our pains 
He shares with us to the last mortal sob. 

No chance in all the universe can rob 

One injured soul that in His ear complains; 
With our hot tears He cleanses all our stains. 
And from the unanguishing impenitent mob 
103 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

Rescues one desperate discouraged heartbroken 
Immortal spirit ! If I could but wake up, 
And go upon glad feet about my share 

Of the world's work, as a devout love-token 
To God and family and mankind, my cup 
Of joy would overflow, that now fills with despair ! 



Ill 

Like one who bears a burden a long way. 

Until his body on a twist stays bent, 

So I have borne shame and discouragement; 

And while I have grown steadier day by day, 
Yet have not lost the child instinct to play 

With little children, and am confident 

My task is right for me, I do resent 

With growing irritation and dismay 
The limits of this life. I am distraught 

With too much care. There seems here no occasion 

For such high spirit in so frail a mask. 
With exquisite sensibilities for thought 

Wasting away in painful determination, * 

Unequal to the stupifying provident task. 



IV 

Old Age is in the distance yet; but now 

I glimpse him hobbling slowly whither I haste 
To find 'tis I ! The past grows like a waste 
Of momentary sands that have somehow 

104 



SONNETS: IN TRAVAIL OF SOUL 

Escaped me ! While to each day's tasks I bow. 
Time flees away! The future I once faced 
Now faces me, and nothing done ! Disgraced 
I go to meet my doom, with wrinkled brow, 

But unafraid. For I have long reflected : 
(And all must think as I who feel as truly) 
We need and seek and find and love God more 

The more our self-dependence is subjected 
To merciless defeat; for strong and holy 
And wondrous kind is He Whom we adore. 



Forgive me, Master, that I vainly thought 
Advancement by my strictest care to earn. 
Be Thy great sacrifice my chief concern, 
That what Thy life hath in my spirit wrought 

Truthfully I may teach, as Thou hast taught. 
Oh ! may my heart a living altar bum. 
Where by devotion's constancy I learn 
God's blessed will, to do it as I ought. 

When I have sadly fail'd, as all must fail. 
The measure of my lack, sweet Lord, supply. 
When I have toil'd in vain for Love's dear sake. 

My earthbom weaknesses when I bewail, 
And seem so small I almost wish to die, — 
Thou art my Heaven-sent Comfort in heartache. 



105 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 



VI 

Among the first immortals of all time 

I take my lowest place with childlike wonder. 
All weaknesses forgiven, and every blunder 
Religiously ignored, each faulty rime 

Seen to be there to offset the sublime, 

Foil brilliant lightning and majestic thunder, 
So any child who will may read and under- 
stand the plain Issue ! It had been high crime 

To prostitute such office ! Not for gain 
Or literary note I sacrificed 
Those lesser principles, if that be proved 

Against me. Isolated unto pain, 

I laught and pray'd and have immortalized 
In secret agony the friends I loved. 



VII 

MY fine-spirited ideal friends ! — 

Than whom none more devout, in flesh and blood. 
Could walk the rugged ways of hardihood 
Required of man and woman — oft these hands 

To you in anguish I reach out! But bands 
Bind my else broken life, to Ultimate Good 
In silence held. We seem not understood 
By one another; but God understands; 

And Heaven will recompense our isolation 
With grand according unity, whose bond 
Is Christ. Meanwhile our undivided trust 
106 



SONNETS: IN TRAVAIL OF SOUL 

We to one Father yield, and through submission 
Find our lives lifted to bright hopes beyond 
The sordid facts of an age that seems unjust. 



VIII 

From intense childhood have I mused and dream 'd 
That I God's messenger of Life must prove ; 
At home was early nicknamed "Brotherly Love," 
For the stout hope, that I, tho fools blasphemed, 

G)uld make men love each other ! I esteem'd 
As heroes all who generously strove 
Against oppressive lies to help improve 
The human race, that all might be redeem'd ! 

Abject and helpless I must never be ! 
So much vain error still to contradict! 
Such unjust arrogant insidious wrong! 

My yet first fond ambition urges me 
With an undying hope to the conflict, 
Wherein I still imagine myself strong ! 



If only I can keep a few firm friends, 

Before them always Gertrude, to the close 

Of my impetuous career that owes 

How much to her and them! — and when life ends. 

Can look into their faces, hold their hands. 
And know they love me with a love that glows 
And brightens through Eternity, where those 
Who 've gone await my soul as it ascends 
107 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

To meet its Maker and the Christ in peace, — 

Then shall God show me how to live as they. 

Whose manageable temperaments here 
Encourage me to hope and never cease 

Attempting in my wild original way 

That Life of Love which seems for me the most sincere. 



Father, I for myself nothing request, 

But that I be found watching when this tent 
I leave, to join in peace the grand ascent 
Of all immortals unto that high Rest 

Which Thou hast promised all who stand steadfast 
In Thee, Exalted Purpose of my being ! 
Oh, aid me to that End ! With bright foreseeing 
Support my weakness mightily to the last ! 

All Earth must fail me then — why trust it now? 
All flesh will then be weak to save my soul, 
Or lend me any comfort. Oh — before 

That hour shall come, — today, while yet my brow 
Pulsates with young ambition, — Lord, control 
My passionate thinking! — make me love Thee more! 



lOB 



SUMMER AND SUBMISSION 



SUMMER AND SUBMISSION 



CASTING ALL YOUR CARES UPON GOD, 
FOR HE CARETH FOR YOU" 

Content to serve with my fellows, 

One of an infinite throng, 
I have not denied my soul the joy 

Of fellowship in song, 
But finding men preoccupied, 

Have waited and labor'd apart. 
In ignorance, but with gratitude 

And the peace of God in my heart* 

Had I felt mature and ready. 

Or been what I ought to be, 
I could have enjoy'd an audience; 

Men might have listen'd to me; 
But I distrusted ambition; 

All thought of self seem'd sin ; 
I must write worthier, and become 

Better than I had been. 

The pleasure of self-expression 

Was incentive enough. I kept 
Thinking, writing, thinking, 

Sometimes when I should have slept; 
111 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

But I never supposed myself 

Other than just a lad 
Following his natural bent, 

As great men before me had. 

There have been mysteries in my life 

That I do not try to explain ; 
Some of God's ways, too deep for me. 

Mysterious must remain; 
If I know enough to be truthful. 

And to do as I know I should, 
I shall find out by experience 

More than I otherwise could. 

As long as my strength held out. 

The wish to pursue my way 
In undisturb'd meditation. 

Like a child busy at play, 
Prevail'd over the wistful 

And sometimes passionate yearning 
For universal companionship 

As a lover devoutly discerning. 

While youth was in my favor 

I forged ahead on trust; 
But my warning body refuses now 

To let me toil as I must; 
This feeble frame is failing; 

My brain rebels ! A clod, 
I rise and struggle against my fate, 

Bewilder'd, but trusting God. 
112 



''HE CARETH" 

Long nights I cannot sleep; 

Dull months I cannot wake. 
In a boat with an unlocated leak 

I am sinking, far out in the lake! 
Now while I can I must signal for help ■ 

Must humble my heart and pray 
That God's good will to men be still 

Done in my life today. 

In secret now no longer 

I '11 boyishly hide my past; 
I must bring forth to judgement 

What must perish with what will last. 
If a few years more are mine. 

And this task is soon begun. 
Perhaps I can get it finish'd yet. 

And enjoy seeing it done. 

Why should I hesitate in love? 

In trust why hesitate? 
God's faithfulness is instant; 

His kindness does not wait. 
I cannot prove as faithful 

And patient as I would; 
But I must act as if I were 

Gentle and wise and good. 

To all who will receive me, 

Without reserve or sham. 
In the spirit of Jesus my Master 

I offer all I am. 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

I feel so frank and friendly 

To every human soul, 
I cannot help but give myself. 

Full and complete and whole. 

In spite of and because of 

The faults we cannot mend 
We gravitate toward each other: 

I am everybody's friend. 
In spite of and because of 

Our faults, I cannot cease 
Hoping for and anticipating 

Universal peace. 

Or ever that time approaches 

When all men shall be friends, 
Let me for the world's shortcomings 

Hasten to make amends; 
For unless I still be friendly 

In a world where friends are few, 
I cheat the world of its greatest need. 

Even as others do. 

Let us make one more effort. 

As ever, with open heart; 
Tho we meet the same discouragement. 

To be friendly is our part. 
I cannot drive my body; 

My nerves refuse to rest; 
This is my solemn duty 

To those whom I love best. 

114 



"HE CARETH" 

It is my sacred duty; 

I dare not shirk it therefore; 
Heaven is my Witness : 

I will somehow publish once more. 
And if none cares to heed me, 

Low may my heart be bow'd. 
To do the will of my Father, 

To be true and meek and proud. 

The hour will come, is coming. 

When all men shall be kind; 
Tho I shall not live to see it, 

Let me bear it well in mind. 
In the Place where I am going. 

To meet my Master There, 
I shall be glad to have served Him, 

And to have trusted His care. 

Maybe I am not doing 

As He would have me do. 
Perhaps I need discouragement. 

I am ready, if that is true. 
But I feel impel'd with hope 

To lay before my friend 
The fact that he can help me now, 

Or if not now, in the end. 

Someone some day will care enough; 

I may not be here then ; 
God will choose my friends for me. 

He knoweth whom and when; 
115 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

My choice might not be His ; 

But I must hear and heed : 
Must act now on what light I have, 

In my hour of greatest need. 

I seek but what in Heaven 

Is known to be best for me. 
Here I am, a little child, 

Dependent, Lord, on Thee. 
The good I desire, yet hinder, 

Thy love must bring about; 
Thou wilt not compromise with sin; 

Thou dost not deal in doubt. 

Because I have lived to exalt Thee, 

Thou hast not regarded my shame ; 
Thou hast loved me with a deathless love. 

More precious than gold or fame ! 
And tho ardently devoted 

To Thee Whom I adore, 
I must try harder to serve Thee 

Than I ever have heretofore. 

As long as I may live, 

Tho every hour I die, 
I would please Thee, my Maker, 

And let all else go by. 
Such is my heart's intent; 

This flesh will fail, I know; 

But in Thy great compassion, 

Father, 'twere better so. 
116 



SUMMER AND SUBMISSION 



PASTORAL 

Clovers in the heavy dew, 
I must wade barefoot through you ; 
I must press you and pass over 
Your bright heads, you pretty clover; 
I must feel sensations sweet 
Through my happy naked feet. 
While they drink the dew down there, 
As I drink the morning air. 

Here in soft moonbeams last night 
You were fair and sparkling bright; 
For I waded through you then 
On my way back home again. 
I was looking for my cow. 
The same one I'm hunting now; 
Gone from home since yestermom, 
Is she hiding in the corn? 

Just before she freshens thus 
She escapes and hides from us: 
A wild way some Jerseys have 
When they are about to calve. 
Cows, wet clover and hot sun. 
Of all combinations, none 
Fills with such portentious dread 
The anxious dairyman's tired head. 

I feel almost glad she's gone. 
Else I might not in the dawn 
117 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

And at dusk and by the moon 
Have enjoy 'd you so this June, 
I must work so many hours, 

you lovely wealth of flowers. 
Lifting glad a lake of gems 
On all your glittering diadems ! 

Pink alsike, with little red; 
Giant, some, with coarser head; 
White, on stems that would be tall; 
Herdsgrass waving over all ; 
With a fleabane here and there, — 
Naughty daisies, yet so fair! 
What more beautiful could be 
Than this scented scene to me ! 

Far and near this time of year 
Joy is in the atmosphere ! 
Everywhere I go I feel 
Nature's generous appeal ! 
Pleasures restful to the mind 
Would, tho I were deaf and blind, 
Reach my inmost consciousness 
With warm power to soothe and bless. 

There my cow stands yonder — see — 
Like a wild deer watching me — 
Nose and horns uplifted — yes — 
Shy, alert and motionless. 

1 must pause here, too, a while. 
Conjuring up all my guile ; 

118 



"CLOVERS IN THE HEAVY DEW" 

For by many a breathless chase 
Well I know with cows my place. 

Sook, sook, sook, sook, 
Sook, bossy, come, a nubbin, look. 
No? Won't have it? Well, we'll wait. 
Take your time, tho it is late. 
There's no hurry, take it aisy. 
As the Irish say, come, Daisy, 
Come, a last year's nubbin, look, 
Sook, sook, sook, sook, — 

(0 you tantalizing dumb 
Statue of a wild thing, come!) 
Come, my pet, — there, ah, soft, now. 
Don't be naughty, pretty cow, 
(Handling stubborn folks and cattle, 
Gentleness is half the battle) 
Nod your head, not shake it, no, 
Not that way, but meekly, so. 

I can wait if you can, missus : 
Must I throw boquets and kisses? 
All my milking yet to do. 
And me held up here by you ! 
Well, what nerve! — leisurely there 
Eating clover ! — I de-clare ! 
And me patiently here waiting? 
Say but you are aggravating ! 

Ah! She makes a move, at last! 
Gentle creature, not so fast, — 
119 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

Here, I have a nubbin for you, — 
Wait and see — wait, I implore you — 
Do not make me chase you so, 
Liberty is sweet, I know; 
But in pasture it were best 
For my cows to graze and rest. 

Long time holding out the corn, 
Talking sweet, (She shakes her horn! 
She is eyeing me as tho 
Wild with fear ! ) behind her, slow. 
Startling not her timid strength, 
Towards the fence I edge at length. 
And with tact sagacious gain 
And ope, the gate into the lane. 

Thence round to her other side, 
Still by brute suspicion eyed, 
Gradually up I come 
Straight along the fence toward home. 
Steady, steady, not too fast, 
Pausing at the gate at last. 
Where the ear of corn, tost over, 
Lures her, tempts her, from the clover; 

Through the prison gap she looks, 

Halts and barkens, lows and hooks. 

Lifting head and watching round 

For a sight — for a sound — 

Of the herd, remember'd lost: 

— Seen! — with head and tail uptost, 

120 



"CLOVERS IN THE HEAVY DEW" 

Through she scampers and away 
Down the pasture as in play ! 

Welcoming their lost mate now, 
One butts her and one licks her brow; 
Heifers, playing, push each other; 
Old cows think that too much bother; 
Standing by the creek in mud, 
Sleepy-eyed, they chaw the cud; 
Others, couchant, ruminate; 
Calves bawl at the barnyard gate. 

Primal creature, dumb and daring. 
Wild, unthinking and uncaring. 
In the stable you must go. 
For I fear to trust you so. 
At the brook you'll drink your fill; 
Clover, though so fair, can kill ! 
But less danger if shut in. 
Salted daily as you Ve been. 

Good that you no milk were giving, 
Else you might not now be living; 
Bloated paunch and fever'd udder, — 
When I think of it I shudder ! 
So, because I know your nature, 
As I pity you, poor creature, 
I must at an empty manger 
Tie you safe a while from danger. 

Twelve days, if I err not, till. 
Fresh again, my pails you '11 fill 
121 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

With your warm rich foaming flow, 
— There, now, truant, in you go! 
If a heifer calf you bear. 
Or of twins a lucky pair, 
Glad I '11 be, as I raised you, 
To bring up your increase, too. 

So oh! So oh! 

(I '11 have to drive them up, I know; 
Might as well start first as last; 
After milking time goes past. 
Until flies get bad, they 're crazy 
For the outdoors, and as lazy 
As fat swine!) Hey! Sun your beds! 
Get up, solemn sleepy-heads, — 

Hey there! — hey! — must I throw stones 
To start you, old lazybones ? 
Shall I pound you like a gong? 
Wake up, Dinah, move along! 
All the rest will follow you, 
(If they take a notion to) 
Throw your carcass into gear ! — 
Confound you ! — get out of here ! 



122 



SONNETS 



HOMEWARD AT SUNDOWN 



With hoe and rake on shoulder, home returning, 
I hear a thrush's note in yonder grove : 
He carols to his mate as to my love 
I soon shall say sweet words of tender yearning. 

Homeward with lingering step, the bright day burning 
Beyond yon tall dark trees that tower above — 
Still, still I pause to hear him singing of 
His little joys, as in the golden morning 

I heard him, and shall hear him till the heat 
Saddens his happy heart, as mine will sadden. 
Ah, lyric voice, to hear your song no more ! 

Yet may the cool dawns from this deep retreat 
Call forth a few birdnotes my heart to gladden; 
And June will come again with roses to my door. 



SABBATH AFTERNOON 

Delightful day ! happy day of days ! 

God's Inn, the tired soul's wayside rest ! With joy 
From my sore heart the burdens of the week 
I lay aside, and with glad thoughts of praise. 

In humble gratitude let me employ 

These blessed moments ! Down the pasture creek 
I '11 wander, and in rapt love as I gaze 
Upon all beauteous things that never cloy 

My spirit, I will let my Father speak 

With His tired child, who seriously plays 
That he is now no more a simple boy, 

123 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

But a big provident man! I will be meek, 

And let the brook flow through my heart and bear 
All stains away that might be lingering there. 



THE LIVING RAIMENT 

Creation is the veil of Deity, 

The garment of our God. Flower and gem. 

Symbolic of His attributes we see, 

Bost and embroider 'd on the healing hem, 
And stars and moon adorn His diadem 

Beyond our mortal reach. Glad let us be 

To touch His vestures and be heal'd by them; 

For tho these fair devices are not He, 
His rugged robes they prank; and from His heart 

The simple virtues which His children need. 

Through blossoms flowing fresh to us, impart 
The grace to trust His love. Then let us heed. 

As Jesus taught, the message of the flowers. 

And make through faith in God their childlike beauty ours. 



THE king's IMAGE AND SUPERSCRIPTION 

Art thou from bodily afflictions free ? 

Health perfect? And is that what you call blest? 

Unhinder'd livest thou thy life with zest? 

And thinkest thus to sympathize with me, 
As if I were afflicted ? Who envies thee ! 

Rejoice in strength while perfect health shall last; 

But let me, too, rejoice, that in the test 

My spirit fails not. Gold coins let us be, 

124 



SONNETS 

Enjoying circulation from the Hand 

That minted us, mediums of exchange 

Between two countries, I worn smooth with spending. 
Thou new, but both redeemable in that Land 

From whence we came; and think it, friend, not strange 

If the unhoarded coin, batter 'd, is still worth lending. 



"i KNOW now" 

I KNOW now what has hurt me all these years. 

I have not fail'd ; have been no sloath nor coward ; 

Have stood up under heavy odds, empower'd 

By the Almighty over doubts and fears 
To triumph ! And I trust with grateful tears, 

By His shed blood Who died for me and shower'd 

My life with every blessing, to have tower'd 

Above at least myself. Humbled through cares 
And bodily imperfections, through sorrow chasten'd, 

I foresee and shall steadfastly expect 

Good and good only out of all my trials. 
Not yet so great but I can stand erect 

And bear them still with laughter — at least with smiles 

As forward on the winged years I 'm hasten'd. 



''when I CONSIDER IN WHAT BLESSED WAYS" 

When I consider in what blessed ways 

My feet have f alter 'd all down through the years, 

I think of a lost child that perseveres 

From home and mother, wanders aside and plays, 

125 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

Then suddenly remembers that it strays ! — 
And turns and runs, crying with piteous tears 
To know in which direction! — thinks it hears 
Its name! — its mother's voice! — one instant stays 

To listen — and then flees to her caress, 

And goes with her toward home ! So I at seasons 
Have been rebellious one hour, and the next 

Most penitent and docile. Deep distress 
Has deepen'd my obedience and vext 
My spirit racially^ for universal reasons I 



"dreaming of uving, till our life be past" 

When I desire to do what I cannot, 

I wrong my Maker and my race and age, 
Failing to be what I might be and what 
In God's foresight were my best heritage. 

Thus do we miss by too much toil our wage. 
Too far afield pursuing rainbow gold. 
And after many a wasted pilgrimage 
Return, wishing that we were not grown old. 

Fondly we let our spirits be control'd 

By future thoughts and idle quests for power, 
Till wasted years have left our pulses cold, 

And on regret we squander many an hour. 
Ardently from our earliest to our last 
Dreaming of living, till our life be past. 



126 



SUMMER AND SUBMISSION 



SHIPS AT EVENING 

No rose that ever bloom'd 

Is so beautiful to me 
As a graceful sailing vessel. 

At sunset, on the sea! 
And I watch it change from white. 

Through rose and gold, to blue. 
Till it passes out of sight. 

And is lost to my view 
In the night, 
When, 
No star that ever sparkled 

Speaks more mystery to me 
Than a distant sailing vessel. 

At twilight, on the sea! 

Long after it is gone. 

Lost in the gathering gloam, 
I can feel it, sailing on, 

Through ocean, toward its home ! 
By a sense more sure than sight 

It cleaved the bounding bay ! — 
And my spirit with delight 

Goes with it, on its way. 
Through the night! — 
Till, 
No poem ever utter'd 

Is so musical to me 
As the motion of that vessel, 

Through the darkness, on the sea! 
127 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 



HESPERUS 

This evening as I came out of the woods, 

The wide west still aglow with divine flame, 

And all the deep green darkling in the glow, 

A star shone sudden above one of the trees 

That cloud the skyline there, a silver star. 

Bright in bright gold, a large clear lovely world. 

Far, very far away from our sad Earth, 

Farther than any thought of time could go ; 

So far, it look'd a gem in the deep sky. 

And not a distant sun to which our globe 

Were nothing. Long I watch'd it as I walk'd. 

And when I tum'd it seem'd to follow me 

From hill to hill, now high above the dark 

As I ascended, now hidden as I went down 

The valley road that brought me on toward home, 

Absorb'd in my dream thoughts, and in that star. 

That silver light, from which I took rapt eyes 

Only to rest them in the gathering gloom, 

That deepen'd as I went, till all but heaven 

Was dark. There many stars made grand the night, 

Scatter'd through wide expanse of beauteous blue, 

Whereof the solemn trees were witnesses ; 

And shadowy fields and gurgling waterbrooks 

Enjoy 'd them, for they sparkled as if they 

Knew, and were happy with me. Often I linger'd. 

And the man-haunting Spirit That pervades 

The universe with holy rapturous awe 

Paused, or went homeward with me, as toward Heaven, 

128 



MIDNIGHT THUNDER SHOWERS 

He hourly brings me, His delighted child. 
Or sick with grief, but trustful by His help. 
And wishing nothing that I must not have, 
Because I am already passing rich, 
Being so thrill'd with His great fellowship, 
That whispers to my spirit peace and strength. 
Here soon by dear expectant wife and children 
Met with affectionate welcome, I arrived 
Within my earthly home, as we in His 
Must soon arrive, so fast the Earth speeds on. 
So true to His true heart are all His works, 
His purpose and His power so kind and sure. 



THUNDER SHOWERS NEAR MIDNIGHT 

Last night. 

After the moon had gone. 
Leaving the lovely stars more bright. 
We stood out on the lawn. 
And watcht the black storm coming, rolling on. 
And felt its hush, and saw faint flashes of light. 
And heard it as it loom'd, roaring, rising in height, 
Upgathering all its furious rumbling might 
To scare with mountainous delight 
The puifmg little zephyrs 

Before it scampering like frighten'd bullocks and heifers 
And lay the dust 
With gust after gust 
Of driving windy downpour 
Out of the muflled bellowing uproar 

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BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

And far moaning 

Of the heavy high-explosive deep-detoning 
Thunder ! — 
Lit 

With child-frightening 
Lightning ! 

— As tho the Titan powers 
That sit 

Above the thick clouds, with crystal showers 
Of derisive wit 

Were satirizing our old pious theologic heathen blunder. 
And in a rolicking spasm 
Of giant mirth— 
A vast fit 

Of reverberant iconoclasm — 
Were blasting heaven and earth 
Asunder ! 

— While from the wide shelter 
Of the porch we were under, 
Where we ran helter-skelter 
With glee 

From wind, rain and lightning, we 
In awe-struck ecstatic wonder 
Watch and list 

Through the night and the cool fresh flying mist 
The grand on-going elemental war, 
And the running water and the swollen springbrook's 
brawling roar! 



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SUMMER AND SUBMISSION 



SABBATH EVENING IN DOG DAYS 

We must go now and let the creatures out; 

All day in the cool stable have they on straw 

Been hiding from the flies that plague them so; 

It is not long till evening; come, Virginia, 

We '11 turn them out and drive them down the pasture; 

And there we '11 watch the minnows in the brook, 

And gather wildflowers for the supper table. 

And spend a pleasant hour wandering and wading 

And sitting telling stories in the shade. 

Best hang your little check sunbonnet up; 

You '11 hardly need it this late. Dearie. You stand 

And guard the door while I go drive them out; 

Here, take this lath, and if they lag, slap them; 

Watch lively — stay right where you are — now hear? 

Don't get out in their way, you might get hurt; 

The gate 's closed, so they can't break for the stanchions. 

How satisfied they look reposing there 

In the cool shadows, drowsily chawing the cud — 

Come, the big box stall doors are open wide. 

File out, you sleepy cows ! They take their time, 

The stupid things, cow-fashion, looking at me 

From big dark bright expressionless innocent eyes. 

With all the dumb sang-froid of the brute beast. 

Watch out now, here they come! Get out, slow pokes! 

Old Dinah, she 's the head of the dynasty — 

Stand back — they're coming, Indian file — Lucinda — 

Jemima — Chloe — Belinda — Aunt Maria — 

Big black Susanne — all might have red bandanas 

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BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

Tied round their heads, like southern darky mammies; 

Only, cows can't be jolly. Buttercup, 

You naughty cow, get out; and shame on you. 

To have to wear that poke over your neck 

To keep you in the pasture ! Better call you 

The Yellow Peril. But you 're not as breachy 

As the Red Devil that we had to butcher, 

Or that Black Demon that just stood around 

And lookt like Satan studying up mischief. 

Steers, weanlings, yearling heifers, the twins, Blackie 

And Brownie, Gloomy the bull, all out. Now, Queen, 

Come, Queen, your stall door's open too. Queen, Come. 

Come, good old faithful horsie, you 're out of jail. 

You solemn sleepy jade, wake up, join the procession — 

Get out — scat — spat her — that's right. Shut the door. 

All dawdle down the lane through the big gate 

That opens into pasture; and we follow. 

For a brief Sabbath hour till milking time. 

Isn't it fine to live on our home farm. 

And keep so many cattle that give milk. 

With goodie cream, for little ones to drink. 

And careful Mama to make butter and cheese 

And — yes, cookies! — and with such a pleasant pasture, 

And running water to catch minnows in, 

And crawdads? That 's how Papa used to play 

When he was a little person; only his parents 

Lived in the city, and he always had 

To trudge out where farms were and find such fun 

Away from home, and — Oh, yes, he got tired. 

And hungry, too, and had to wait to eat 

Till he got back, even if it was dark. 

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SABBATH EVENING IN DOG DAYS 

But you live right here, and don't have to hunt 

For places to be happy in; why, no, 

Of course you don't ; we just stay here at home 

And laugh and play and run and shout and sing 

And pick wildflowers and sit down and rest 

Wherever and whenever we want to. 

That is, you can, and I when I 'm not busy. 

Well, yes, dear, I am busy most of the time; 

Some day perhaps we '11 come back here and live 

As I have always wisht we might. Some day. 

I cannot bear to think of giving up ; 

I love my work; if fondness be call'd love. 

Bred in me from I know not how far back; 

We have been happy here, haven't we. Sweetheart? 

We think it fun — don't we? — just being glad. 

And doing right, and living among fields 

And woods, where birds of many kinds make love 

And sing and build their nests and brood upon 

Frail eggs and feed soft fledglings and teach them 

To fly ! Tomorrow, when you go to Dayton 

To visit Grandma and see Cousin Mildred 

And David and Auntie Maud and Uncle Walter, 

Aunt Lizzie, and I could not name them all, — 

Oh, yes, you could, I know; and they '11 be pleased 

To see our girlie, too! — then you can tell them 

About the birds and flowers, the calves and — yes. 

And minnows — look at all those silver minnows. 

How swiftly they can fin upstream against 

The current, among rocks, and never strike 

Nor hurt themselves; like birds that flit and dart 

Among the branches of the trees and never 

133 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

Are knockt about by them as we would be. 
Now we '11 start back, wading and gathering flowers. 
Yes, goldenrod — hi! — yonder skips a rabbit! — 
Run, bunny, for your life! — there, now, he squats, 
A tuft of grass but for his big dark eye 
Looking this way — ho! — bouncing cottontail! — 
Over the hill and gone! Follow my finger — 
A striped water snake sunning on that flat rock, 
See? No, stand still, no, he can't hurt you, no, 
I wouldn't let him anyhow. We '11 shy 
A — stone-aX-him — see him slide off the moss 
Into the reeds and grasses — there he is — 
Look — that's his ugly head, close to the bank. 
There — in the shadow where the roots and sod 
Are undermined — an old snag — now he's — here- 
There he goes now across to the other side — 
The nasty things! All right, we '11 go; I hate 
The looks of serpents — and a snake 's a snake. 
No difference if colubers are harmless. 
Yes, now we'll gather flowers — Queen Anne's lace 
For Mama-dear. This is almost the last 
Of the butterflyweed. It looks, I sometimes fancy, 
Like pink sheep laurel that grows wild in Maine, 
Where Sister Edith was a little thing, 
Younger than you are now by several years. 
Yes, I believe she thinks of us and loves us; 
We might go see her almost any day; 
Don't ever let yourself doubt Jesus' word. 
No matter what else happens. Life and death 
And time and space are very real to us. 
And sadly tragic sometimes ; but our trust 

134 



SABBATH EVENING IN DOG DAYS 

Is not in them; we know our Father loves us. 
Is faithful, so we leave it all with Him, 
Dear little children, doing what we can 
The best we know, each hour. For scarlet, we '11 pick 
Boneset; this blush makes the green sessile leaves 
More floral than the grayish flower heads, I think. 
Don't you? — the plant our grannies used to dry, 
To steep a bitter tea from, in the days 
Of chills and fever, when the land was dark 
With forests, and green stagnant water stood 
All summer, breeding sickness, until the air 
Hung laden with dank poison call'd miasma. 
Fierce gnatclouds of mosquitoes tortured cattle, 
And almost drove the people mad, at times. 
Hot nights they had to shut both doors and windows 
To get a little miserable sleep. 

They had no screens then. Dearie, but cotton netting; 
And few had even that in the early days. 
And Oh, the flies ! They were a pest ! They buzz'd 
In swarms all over everything all day. 
Got in the milk, the butter and the cooking. 
Kept babes awake, wore poor tired mothers out. 
And tantalized the sick and aged. Mealtime 
Somebody had to stand and wave a flag 
Above the table — strips of tissue paper 
Tackt on a long stick, often neatly made 
In colors — to shoo darting flies from food, 
So tired and sweaty souls could eat in peace. 
We children had to do that. Many a time 
I 've thought my back would cave in and my arms 
Break! But no doubt it did us good. We learn'd 

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BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

Kind thoughtfulness for other people's comfort, 
And gratitude for the conveniences 
We now enjoy. Rooms were kept darken'd all day 
With drawn blinds and closed shutters until evening. 
And had a stale cool smell. Asparagus 
Was stuck up behind pictures about the walls 
For flies to settle on. And calcimining. 
Especially in blue, for flies hate blue, 
Was common. In some dining rooms, but more 
In grocery stores, meat stalls and barber shops. 
And generally in public eating places. 
Large fancy-pattem'd rosette paper hangings 
Adom'd the ceiling around chandeliers 
And chain-suspended lamps, as roosts for flies, 
To protect things from being all speckt up. 
Ague? Yes, almost everyone had ague; 
And delicate children sometimes died of it. 
I was a delicate child, but I pull'd through. 
That always seem'd a miracle to my mother. 
To me it is a greater miracle 
That any frail child could survive the doctors 
And epidemics of those days. Yes, Dearie, 
In Indianapolis, where I was bom. 
And where we lived till I was four years old, 
There was a ditch near our street call'd Pogue's Run; 
And wading there, I got all through my system 
Those noxious mold effluvia. Mosquitoes, 
We now know, differing from these common kinds. 
Harbor the parasitic spores that cause 
In human blood the febrile paroxysms 
Call'd intermittent fever, autumn chills, 

136 



SABBATH EVENING IN DOG DAYS 

And like names; and some such malignant mites 

Probed and infected me with ague. Ugh! 

It was a wretched melancholy feeling ! 

One minute you began to get seasick, 

And then a slow chill crept up from your spine 

All through your body and extremities 

And took you and shook your dead bones till your teeth 

Chatter'd with cold the hottest summer days. 

And when the chill had taken its spite out on you, 

It left you burning up with a dry fever. 

At last you broke out in a sweat; the drug. 

Whatever they had given you, was working; 

The room swung round ; your ears buzz'd ; and your head 

Had to be propt up with a pillow. They sweat me. 

Gave me hot footbaths, and I was kept wrapt up 

In heavy comforts, until I could not walk, 

I was so weak. The doctors dosed all victims 

With quinine, but my mother twisted it 

In thinnest onion skin so I could take it 

And wash it down without that bitter taste. 

Capsules were not in use; or I saw none. 

Family physicians known as allopaths 

Prescribed strong medicine for all their patients. 

Because they knew no better; and some men 

Kept up on whisky; many became drunkards; 

Ague was such a plausible excuse. 

There always is a better way. One morning 

A kind old German marketwoman came 

And told my mother to enswathe my feet 

In so much salt with so much cayenne pepper, 

Nine days; and when they took those saltbags off, 

137 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

Would you believe? — my feet were green with stain 
That had to wear away; and from that time 
I never had malaria any more. 
Nobody in the world knows everything; 
The dopequacks didn't like such granny ways 
Of curing sickness; but it cured me. Wait — 
I '11 bend down this tall ironweed — you break 
The purple plume for your boquet — you can't? — 
Let me. And now, self-heal, — swamp dahlias, yes. 
And yellow black-eyed susans, with bright blue. 
Lobelia, a quack potion sick folk steept 
For that disgusted feeling at their food ; 
Indian tobacco. Yes, they say the Indians 
Dried it and smoked the leaves. Put in a few racemes 
Of this large-flower'd handsome kind. Oh — yonder 
May be some cardinals yet, across the brook! 
I '11 ride you on my back so you won't bruise 
Your feet. All right, we '11 wade, then, give me your hand< 
One time, when I was little, and we lived 
Near Wolf Creek, in Miami City, now call'd 
West Dayton, in a desperate hour I stole 
From my sick mother's almost empty purse 
A little bright new silver three-cent piece ; 
And weak with guilty fear, I started out 
To wade across Wolf Creek and see the world ! 
1 got out in the middle, where the stream 
Flow'd kneedeep, and in my excitement the money 
Slipt from my hand! I saw it, but the water 
Stream'd on so fast I could not reach down straight 
To where it waver'd in the sunlit gravel. 
It would not stay still for an instant. Dizzied, 

138 



SABBATH EVENING IN DOG DAYS 

I turn'd back; but the current running then 
The other way, bewilder'd me. I sat — 
Gasping — a — mong — crawdads — flounder'd a — shore. 
And made for home ! So we '11 wade back again 
And move up stream, for it grows late. First, the, 
These curving tall swamp grasses in among 
The richly color'd flowers will add grace. 
I '11 trim the lower thorns from this bull thistle. 
Letting some prickly leaves appear above. 
With a few blades of calamus to curve 
And wave over them all, blending their odor 
With steeples of spearmint, and the darker leaved 
And stronger scented peppermint. And now 
We 're ready to go home ; and on the way, 
A few sprays of forget-me-nots we '11 pick, 
That grow so fresh along the waterside. 
And then some white cress, and 'twill then be time 
For supper. Then I '11 milk my cows, and then 
To bed, and soon asleep, to wake up bright 
And early in the morning; and after brea||cfast, 
Quick as the work's done, off to town you '11 go 
Behind old Queen with Mama in the carriage 
To take the car for Dayton. And what then 
Will Daddy do without his Dearie Love? 
But never mind, you '11 be back Thursday or Friday, 
And I '11 be right there at the car to meet you. 
Have a good time; tell Mildred and David and all 
To come and see us; and when you get — yes, 
Oh, yes, I '11 feed your pigeons and your calfie 
And — yes, but let us go in now, for Mama 
Is waiting supper on us. Look, Gertrude, 

139 



BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

Virginia brought you a big bunch of posies ! 

( Run get some water, and I '11 rearrange 

These in a jardiniere ; for at each plate 

Mother has laid sprays of forget-me-nots, 

With a frail vase of roses where we thought 

To put these ; but this riot will look best 

On the new tabouret that Arthur made; 

Too gorgeous and aromatic for the center 

Of the dining table, isn't it, Virgie?) There! 

Look, Love, isn't that a beautiful boquet ! 

Where's Arthur? — reading? Come, Boy, supper time 

(This big wide porch is a delightful place.) 

Qose up your book, my Son, we 're waiting on you. 



SONNET 

Where August pasture flowers of royal hue 
Offer their sweets to bees and butterflies, 
I will content me looking at the skies. 
Watching the clouds, as oftentimes I do. 

But tho I see the clouds, I think of you; 
And in their glory tho I seem to rise. 
Attended by a flowery paradise 
As fair as ever on this planet grew. 

Yet must I wish that thou wert with me, Dear, 
Sharing my joy, or I with thee shared thine; 
For what in all this world so sweet to me 

As to be conscious that my Love is near ! 
What would I not relinquish if 'twere mine, 
Darling, to choose between all else and thee! 

140 



SUMMER AND SUBMISSION 



NAIAD 

Down, streaming over the gravel. 
Ripples the beautiful water. 
Flowing ever away, 

Laughing and gurgling along — 
There ! — I saw my nymph unravel 

Her hair- — there! — again I caught her — 
Yonder! She shall — aye — 

Shall be the theme of my song ! — 
The mischievous tease of my song ! 

Ah, lovely creature of fancy, 
Provokingly disappearing. 
Glimpsed as a lost surprise 

Round a bowery bend in the brook — 
Why must your fading entrance me 
To follow, all-seeing, all-hearing, 
With expectant quick ears and eyes, 
In vain to listen and look, 
Yet loath not to listen and look ! 

Why at a mocking distance 

Keep me just failing to glimpse thee. 
Wild water-haunting sprite, 
Coquettishly luring me on? 
Though you have no delicious existence. 
Your grace elusive more tempts me 
To peer through the dancing light 
That only reveals thee gone — 
Into other simbeams — but gone ! 
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BY THE BANKS OF STILLWATER 

Soon I must leave these meadows; 
But thou goest where I am going; 
I leave them here, not thee, 
Beside my beloved stream. 
Elsewhere in river shadows, 

Or where clear waters are flowing, 
And in city crowds, I shall see 
My tantalizing dream — 
My unrealizable dream. 

From a little child, shy creature. 
With passionate youthful addresses 

I have woo'd thee, and thought thee fair, 
Call'd! — but thou wilt not wait. 
Still from the past through the future 
I pursue thy vanishing tresses, 
beautiful Freedom! There! — 
Almost, — but just too late! 
Almost, — but always too late! 

No violence will I do thee; 
No, my delight, my darling! 
Still undismay'd I smile, — 
Gone! — but not far away. 
Still undiscouraged I woo thee. 
In the brook's musical purling, — 
In all earth's charms that beguile 
Thou art mine, for thou art Play ! 
Thou art Liberty ! Thou art Play ! 



142 



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Neutralizing agent: Magnesium Oxide 
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